SCO Summit: External Affairs Minister Jaishankar to visit Pakistan in mid-October

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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.

This will be the first visit of India's foreign minister to Pakistan in nearly nine years as the ties between the two neighbours remained frosty over the Kashmir issue and cross-border terrorism emanating from the neighbouring country, reported news agency PTI. 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, PTI reported.

The announcement on Jaishankar's visit was made by external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.

"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," he said at his weekly media briefing, further clarifying that Jaishankar is travelling to the neighbouring country only to attend the SCO Summit.

In August, Pakistan invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi to attend the SCO Summit.

Bilawal Bhutto had visited India last year for SCO 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 considered to be a display of India's commitment to 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 announced the withdrawal of special powers of Jammu and Kashmir and the bifurcation of the state into two union territories on August 5 the same year. Pakistan downgraded diplomatic ties with India after New Delhi abrogated Article 370.

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.

India was the chair of SCO last year. It hosted the SCO Summit virtually in July. For the in-person meeting of the foreign ministers of SCO nations in Goa, former Bilawal Bhutto Zardari visited India last year in May. It was the first visit of a Pakistani foreign minister to India in almost 12 years.

The SCO council of heads of government conclave is the second-highest platform in the grouping, after the SCO heads of state summit that is generally attended by the Indian Prime Minister.

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's association with SCO began in 2005 as an observer. It became a full member state at the Astana Summit in 2017. Pakistan also became a permanent member of SCO the same year.

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

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

(With PTI inputs)