The leaders also witnessed the signing of the memorandums of obligations for India and Pakistan to join the SCO, which is a key step for the two countries to obtain membership of the organization.
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Iranian Foreign Minister Mohammad Javad Zarif represented the Islamic Republic at the summit.
The document was jointly signed by the Foreign Ministers of six SCO member states, the Secretary General SCO and the Adviser on Foreign Affairs.
At the Ufa talks in July past year, Pakistan was requested to become a full member of the SCO. Especially in backdrop of recent events particularly agreement of Iran, Afghanistan and India on Chahbahar, there was a growing perception that Pakistan stands isolated, but the SCO membership indeed will greatly serve to offset that perception.
“At the summit held past year in Ufa, Russia, we made a decision to admit to the SCO another two states, India and Pakistan”.
President Mamnoon said Pakistan attached great importance to its ties with Afghanistan and had vital stakes in peace, stability and development in Afghanistan.
In his meeting with Putin, Xi pointed out that this year marks the 15th anniversary of the China-Russia good-neighborly treaty of friendship and cooperation and the 20th anniverary of the two countries’ strategic partnership of coordination.
“The Russian position is clear in its support of initiating the process for Iran’s admission without delays”, Bakhtiyor Khakimov, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s envoy to the organization, told reporters as bloc members met in Uzbekistan on June 23. There is long standing friendship between Russian Federation and India.
India and Pakistan, which enjoyed Observer status in the organisation since 2005, will come on board as full members from the next summit in 2017.
Earlier, in an interview with the Chinese news agency Xinhua, President Putin said the admission of India and Pakistan to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) will make the SCO a more powerful, influential and popular association in the region and worldwide.
“The SCO is an important forum and becoming of its full member especially when new alignments are being made at global level is a significant achievement for Pakistan”, he told the media.
“We believe that after Iran’s nuclear problem was solved and United Nations sanctions lifted, there have been no obstacles left (for Iran’s membership in the SCO)”.
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