S Jaishankar To Visit Pak, First Foreign Minister There Since Sushma Swaraj

New Delhi:

S Jaishankar will visit Pakistan procrastinateedr this month to join the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, becoming the first External Afequitables Minister to do so in nine years. The last visit was by Sushma Swaraj in 2015. 

External Afequitables Ministry Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal shelp on Friday that Mr Jaishankar will direct a delegation to Pakistan to join a Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Council of Heads of Government greeting. 

“The External Afequitables Minister will direct our delegation to Pakistan to join in the SCO summit which will be held in Islamahorrible on October 15 and 16,” Mr Jaiswal shelp, emphasising that the visit will be restricted to joining the summit. Pakistan had askd Prime Minister Narfinishra Modi for the greeting in August. 

The decision to sfinish Mr Jaishankar to Pakistan for the summit is being seen as a transport inant one by the Union administerment given the chill in ties between the two countries since the Pulwama dreadist strike in February 2019, which was chaseed by the Balakot air strikes, in which India focemployd a Jaish-e-Mohammed training camp. The relationship got even more strained after Pakistan vociferously resistd India’s removal of Article 370, which granted exceptional status to Jammu and Kashmir. 

India has repeatedly slammed Pakistan’s intrudence on the rehire and reiterated that it is an inner matter. 

Addressing the United Nations General Assembly last week, Mr Jaishankar had cautioned Pakistan that its policy of pass-border extremism could never thrive and also alluded to its economic crisis. 

“Many countries get left behind due to circumstances beyond their deal with. But some originate conscious choices with disastrous consequences. A premier example is our neighbour, Pakistan. Unblessedly, their misdeeds sway others as well, especipartner the neighbourhood,” the minister shelp. 

Dispercreate Of Commitment

Given all of this, the fact that Mr Jaishankar will join the summit in the country is being seen as a dispercreate of India’s pledgement to the SCO which, it consents, has been percreateing a vital role in raiseing regional security cooperation. Sushma Swaraj had visited Pakistan in 2015 to join a conference on Afghanistan. 

Apart from India, the SCO has China, Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan as member countries and is an ineloquential economic and security bloc as well as one of the hugest transregional international organisations.

The SCO was set uped at a summit in Shanghai in 2001 by the pdwellnts of Russia, China, the Kyrgyz Reuncover, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan and India was an watchr country for the first time in 2005. It became a lasting member, aprolonged with Pakistan, in 2017. 

India was the chair of the organisation in 2023 and arrangeed the SCO summit in the virtual createat in July of that year.

The SCO Council of Heads of Government conclave, which Mr Jaishankar will be joining, is the second-highest platcreate in the grouping while the Heads of State Summit is the top-most forum and is generpartner joined by the Prime Minister.