New Delhi: An Indian official attended the meeting of an expert working group of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation held in Pakistan this week.
A press release issued by the Pakistan defence forces’ public relations wing stated that the ninth Defence and Security Expert Working Group (EWG) meeting of SCO concluded after two days on Thursday, February 20.
“The participating countries besides Pakistan as a host included China, Russian Federation, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and India, whereas Belarus attended the meeting as the observer state,” it stated.
This was the first meeting of the working group under the “SCO Defence & Security Cooperation Plan – 2020”. “The forum discussed different aspects of cooperation between the SCO member states’ and regional security. The participants also exchanged information and opinions on important issues of mutual interest including joint training and military exercises,” said the press release.
According to Dawn, the EWG feeds into the defence minister’s forum of the bloc.
Since becoming members of SCO in 2017, Indian and Pakistani military personnel have participated together in military exercises in Russia. This is probably the first time that a military officer from India had travelled to Pakistan to take part in a SCO meeting.
In September 2019, Pakistan did not attend a military medicine conference of the SCO in Delhi, which was inaugurated by then defence minister Rajnath Singh. The conference was also held under the aegis of the SCO Defence and Cooperation plan.
Since the deterioration in relations over last few years, India and Pakistan don’t invite each other for any multilateral exercise or event hosted on their soil. However, they have had to extend the invitation when the event is held as part of the activities undertaken by the eight-member SCO group.
Last month, the ministry of external affairs had announced that Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan would be issued an invitation for the SCO heads of government meeting in India later this year.
“India will be hosting the SCO heads of government later this year. It is held annually at the prime ministers’ level and discusses the SCO’s program on multilateral and trade cooperation. As per established practice and procedure in SCO, all eight members of SCO, as well as four observer states, and other international dialogue partners, will be invited to attend the meeting,” said MEA spokesperson Raveesh Kumar.