As the president of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), India has sent invitations to all members — including Pakistan and China — for the upcoming foreign ministers' meeting in Goa. The meeting is scheduled on May 4-5, 2023.

India took over the presidency of the 9-member group in September 2022 for a year. The summit will give India and other member countries a platform to discuss multilateral cooperation amid rising tensions from the Russia-Ukraine war and border disputes.

News about the invitation comes weeks after Indian External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar and his Pakistani counterpart Bhutto clashed on the Kashmir crisis at the UN Security Council.

The invitation to Bhutto Zardari was delivered by the Indian high commission in Islamabad, the people cited above said.

It is learnt that an invitation was also delivered to the Pakistani chief justice's office for the meeting of the SCO states' chief justices to be hosted by India in March.

If the Pakistani foreign minister decides to attend the meeting in person, then it will be the first such visit from Islamabad since 2011 when former Pakistani foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar had come to India.

Also read: India slams Pakistan for raking up Kashmir issue at UN — 'Hosting osama bin laden, attacking parliament'

Last year, the SCO summit was held in Uzbekistan and attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. The prime minister met with several global leaders such as Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Also read: SCO Summit 2022 Highlights: PM Modi holds talks with Russian President Putin

Meanwhile, Pakistan is the only SCO member country that has not submitted an entry for the third iteration of the group's annual film festival, the information and broadcasting ministry said.

"There has been no response," Additional Secretary of the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting Neerja Shekhar said in a press conference on Monday.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation comprises of nine countries: China, India, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. As the latest member, Iran will attend the group as a member rather than an observer for the first time under India's presidency of the group.

The SCO is a Eurasian political, economic and security conglomerate and is the world's largest regional organisation in terms of geographic scope and population, accounting for 40 percent of the world population.

With agency inputs.

First Published:Jan 25, 2023 2:22 PM IST