Astana SCO Summit Live: SCO states join hands to counter international terrorism, says President Nazarbayev
Monitoring Desk: President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev has said that heads of SCO member states will pass a statement to counter international terrorism.
While delivering his welcoming speech as Chairman of 17th meeting of the Heads of Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) member states at Astana on Friday, President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev stated that SCO has received international recognition and has become an effective platform.
“Today we agreed to sign a decision on the completion of the procedure for admission and granting the status of a SCO member state to the Republic of India and the Islamic Republic of Pakistan. Admission of new members for us is a new impulse in the development of the organization, and it will promote growth and international prestige”, said President Nazarbayev.
According to Kazakh state media outlets, a draft document awaits signatures of heads of member states of SCO to release a joint statement regarding counteraction to international terrorism.
The heads of state are expected to sign the Astana Declaration that will include 11 documents and a statement against terrorism.
During the today’s summit, the SCO chairmanship will be handed over from Kazakhstan to China to hold 18th SCO Summit in summer of 2018.
New member Pakistan will be useful for SCO as it borders troubled Afghanistan. Prime Minister of Pakistan Nawaz Sharif held a detail meeting with Afghan President Ashraf Ghani at sideline of SCO summit on Friday morning. Pakistan and Afghanistan are experiencing tense diplomatic relations although Pakistan is hosting over four million Afghan refugees for the last three and half decades since time when United States along with Pakistan launched operation Cyclone against former Soviet Union in Afghanistan in 1979.
Pakistan is a long-time partner of China and both countries are busy in completing China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) that is flagship project of One belt One Road initiative of China. SCO membership would help Pakistan for its regional connectivity.
In a statement, Foreign Office spokesperson of Pakistan Nafees Zakaria has said that SCO platform will provide Pakistan a good opportunity to play its role in addressing the challenges being faced by the region. He said SCO will also help Pakistan improve its relations with Central Asian States.
It may be mentioned that archrivals India and Pakistan have signed a document ensuring SCO member states that both countries would rigorously abide by all obligations existing within the SCO’s current agreements and contracts. Both the countries have signed documents that they had timely and unconditionally, without any exceptions, joined the rules of SCO mandatory for all member states and also all other documents (there are about 30 of them).
Pakistan and India confirmed in their applications that they avoid bringing any bilateral disputes to the SCO.
It may be mentioned that the 17th SCO summit will end with the signing of eleven documents, including the Astana Declaration, the Convention on Combating Extremism and a joint statement on countermeasures against international terrorism.
