New Delhi: Terrorism is a threat to regional and global peace, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said during his virtual address to the leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Tuesday, adding that some countries used cross-border terrorism as an instrument of state policy and sheltered terrorists.
“The SCO should not hesitate to criticise such countries. The SCO should condemn terrorism. There is a need for decisive action to deal with it… There should be no double standards on it,” Modi added at the online summit that India is hosting.
The Prime Minister also said Afghanistan’s soil should not be used to destabilise its neighbourhood. “India’s concerns and expectations regarding Afghanistan are similar to those of most SCO countries… We must expand mutual cooperation to deal with terror financing,” he added.
He also asked the member states to work for the welfare of Afghanistan and provide humanitarian aid to the nation.
Pakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif, China’s President Xi Jinping and Russian leader Vladimir Putin participated in the virtual summit. This was Putin’s first appearance at an international event since he crushed a mutiny by the Wagner mercenary group in late June.
Modi shared the virtual stage with Xi for the first time since November when the two leaders were present for the G20 summit in Indonesia.
The last time Modi met Sharif was 10 months ago when they both attended the SCO summit in Uzbekistan.
Modi said Tuesday that during its SCO chairmanship, India has hosted more than 140 events and seminars, and prepared key documents in 14 ministerial meetings.
“As Chair of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), India has made sustained efforts to take our multifaceted cooperation to new heights,” the PM said in his opening remarks. Modi said the SCO had emerged as an important platform for peace, prosperity and development in the Eurasia region, adding that India saw the SCO as an extended family.
In his inaugural address at the 23rd summit of the SCO Council of Heads of States, Modi further noted that security, economic development, connectivity, unity and respect for sovereignty and territorial integrity and environment protection were key to India’s vision for the SCO.
He said: “India has established five pillars of cooperation within the SCO – start-up and innovation, traditional medicine, youth empowerment, digital inclusion and shared Buddhist heritage.”
The theme of India’s chairship of SCO-SECURE was derived from the acronym coined by Modi at the 2018 Qingdao summit. S for security, E for economic development, C for connectivity, U for unity, R for respect of sovereignty and territorial integrity and E for environment protection.
Also in attendance on Tuesday were Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi, Belarus President Alexander Lukashenko, Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev among others.
Formed in 2001 by China and Russia, with former Soviet central Asian states as members and joined later by India and Pakistan, the eight-member SCO is a political and security group and the world’s largest regional organisation. It seeks to counter western influence in Eurasia.
During this summit, Iran was accepted as a member, while Belarus signed a Memorandum of Obligations which will lead to its membership later.
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