ISLAMABAD – Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi will attend themeeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization Council of ForeignMinisters (SCO-CFM) being held in Moscow from September 9 to10.
The invitation to the foreign minister to attend the SCO-CFM was extendedby Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, who would also chair themeeting, the Foreign Office said in a statement on Tuesday.
The SCO-CFM is the highest forum of SCO after the Council of Heads of State(CHS) and the Council of Heads of Government (CHG). It deliberates onimportant regional and international issues, and considers documents forapproval and adoption by the Council of Heads of State.
The Moscow SCO-CFM will consider more than 20 documents for subsequentadoption in the SCO Council of Heads of State. It will also adopt a JointCommuniqué reflecting member states’ unified stance on important regionaland international issues.
Foreign Minister Qureshi will also have bilateral meetings on the sidelinesof the CFM.
SCO’s major objectives include promoting mutual confidence andgood-neighbourly relations among member states; strengthening regionalpeace, security and stability; and creating a framework for effectivecooperation in political, cultural, trade and economy, science andtechnology, education, energy, transportation, tourism, environmentalprotection and other fields.
Read Top Stories
Besides Pakistan, SCO’s current membership comprises China, Russia, India,Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
SCO is an important forum for Pakistan to further enrich deep-rootedhistorical and cultural links with member states, providing the ties asound economic foundation, and promoting it as a regional trade and transitcorridor.
Since becoming a member in 2017, Pakistan has been actively contributing inworking towards achieving the SCO’s multi-sectoral agenda throughparticipation in various SCO mechanisms. From 2005 to 2017, Pakistan was anobserver in the SCO.
