Jaishankar to travel to Pakistan for SCO summit

New Delhi, Oct 4 (PTI) India on Friday announced that External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will travel to Pakistan to attend a conclave of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in mid-October.

The announcement was made by external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.

The last Indian external affairs minister to visit Pakistan was Sushma Swaraj. She had travelled to Islamabad in December 2015 to attend a conference on Afghanistan.

Pakistan is hosting the SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG) meeting on October 15 and 16.

"The external affairs minister will lead our delegation to Pakistan to participate in the SCO summit which will be held in Islamabad on October 15 and 16," Jaiswal said at his weekly media briefing.

The spokesperson clarified that the external affairs minister is travelling to Pakistan only to attend the SCO summit.

In August, Pakistan invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi to the SCO's summit.

Jaishankar's visit to Pakistan assumes significance as it is seen as a major decision on New Delhi's part.

The decision to send the senior minister is seen as a display of India's commitment to the SCO which has been playing a key role in boosting regional security cooperation.

The ties between India and Pakistan came under severe strain after India's warplanes pounded a Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist training camp in Balakot in Pakistan in February 2019 in response to the Pulwama terror attack.

The relations further deteriorated after India on August 5, 2019 announced the withdrawal of special powers of Jammu and Kashmir and the bifurcation of the state into two union territories.

India has been maintaining that it desires normal neighbourly relations with Pakistan while insisting that the onus is on Islamabad to create an environment free of terror and hostility for such engagement.

The SCO council of heads of government conclave is the second-highest platform in the grouping.

The SCO heads of state summit is the top most forum in the grouping that is generally attended by the Indian prime minister.

The SCO, comprising India, China, Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, is an influential economic and security bloc that has emerged as one of the largest transregional international organisations.

India was the chair of the SCO last year. It hosted the SCO summit in the virtual format in July last year.

India's association with the SCO began in 2005 as an observer country. It became a full member state of SCO at the Astana summit in 2017.

India has shown a keen interest in deepening its security-related cooperation with the SCO and its Regional Anti-Terrorism Structure (RATS), which specifically deals with issues relating to security and defence.

The SCO was founded at a summit in Shanghai in 2001 by the presidents of Russia, China, the Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

Pakistan became its permanent member along with India in 2017. PTI