India hosts Pak delegation for SCO meet

INTERNATIONAL DESK: While bilateral relations with Pakistan are still frozen, India and Pakistan continue to engage under the banner of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a Eurasian political and security group that is playing an increasingly important role in Afghanistan and the US -Disposition.

On a rare visit by high-ranking Pakistani government officials, a delegation from Islamabad arrived on Sunday to take part in a cybersecurity conference of the SCO states, the India on the 7th SCO terrorist exercise aimed at promoting cooperation between member states.

The cyber security conference is being organized by the Indian Secretariat of the National Security Council (NSCS), which recently also hosted a regional NSA meeting on the situation in Afghanistan.

The 4 Central Asian countries, which are also full members of the SCO, took part in the Indian Afghanistan Conference, which, according to the government, reflected the regional consensus on important issues of regional stability and security. With the exception of China and Pakistan, all full SCO members, including Russia, attended the conference.

Official sources said the invitation to Pakistan to attend the conference was in line with the SCO’s charter. In their efforts to address security threats and challenges, SCO states are currently considering establishing an SCO information security center in Kazakhstan.

While India continues to claim that Pakistan has done little to contain cross-border terrorism and has accused Islamabad of raising bilateral issues with the SCO, it has also pledged with other members to conduct joint counter-terrorism exercises.

The SCO conference follows Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s summit with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Monday.

India believes that Russia, unlike China, has been sensitive to India’s concerns about cross-border terrorism. While Russia claims that it is up to India and Pakistan to resolve their differences, it also believes that the SCO forum should be used for what remains one of the main goals of the organization – building mutual trust and confidence the neighborhood between the Member States.

(The Times of India)