NEW DELHI, Jul 4: Hosting Chinese President Xi Jinping, his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin, Pakistan’s Shehbaz Sharif and other leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) nations at a virtual summit of the bloc on July 4, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said India supports the proposal for reform, modernisation of SCO.
He said that the food, fuel and fertiliser crisis is a big challenge for all countries in the world surrounded by controversies, tensions, epidemics and there must be united efforts to deal with it.
“As chair of SCO, India has made sustained efforts to take our multifaceted cooperation to new heights. India’s thousands of years old cultural and people-to-people ties with Eurasia living testimony to our shared heritage,” he said, adding that the SCO has emerged as key platform for peace, prosperity, development of Eurasia.
With Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif listening, Mr. odi said there is a need for decisive action to deal with terrorism.
“We have to fight together against terrorism that may be in any form or manifestation,” Mr. Modi said.
He stressed that terrorism has become a threat to regional, global peace. “There is a need for decisive action to deal with it. We must expand mutual cooperation to deal with terror financing… Some countries use cross-border terrorism as an instrument in sync with their policy. SCO must not hesitate to criticise such countries,” Mr. Modi added.
Regarding Afghanistan, the Prime Minister said that India’s concerns and expectations are similar to those of most SCO countries.
The SCO summit under India’s presidency also welcomed Iran as the new permanent member of the grouping. “I am happy that Iran is going to join the SCO family as a new member,” Mr. Modi said.
The SCO, comprising India, China, Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan, is an influential economic and security bloc and has emerged as one of the largest transregional international organisations.
India assumed the rotating chairmanship of the SCO at the Samarkand Summit of SCO on September 16 last year.
Heads of the two SCO bodies — the secretariat and the SCO RATS (Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure) also attended the virtual summit whose theme is “Towards a SECURE SCO’.
The SECURE acronym was coined by Mr. Modi at the 2018 SCO summit and it stands for Security; Economy and Trade; Connectivity; Unity; Respect for Sovereignty and Territorial Integrity; and Environment.
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. Meanwhile, 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. (Agencies)
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