India will participate in a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) national coordinators that Pakistan will host on September 28-30, official sources said. The meeting is expected to approve the calendar of events under Pakistan’s presidency, leading up to the Council of Heads of State (CHS) summit for which Islamabad will soon send out invitations to the leaders of all member-states of the Eurasian bloc, including PM Narendra Modi.After joining the China-dominated grouping in 2017 as a full member, India has participated actively in various SCO mechanisms, with Modi representing India at the heads of state summits and external affairs minister S Jaishankar joining the heads of government meetings.Unlike with SAARC, India has ringfenced its involvement in SCO from outstanding bilateral differences with Pakistan, mainly the core issue of cross-border terrorism, while consistently reminding the Organisation that one of its original mandates was to fight terrorism, extremism and separatism. Government has backed SCO connectivity initiatives too but with the rider that these must respect sovereignty and territorial integrity of all States.India’s national coordinator Alok Dimri is expected to participate in the national coordinators’ meeting that will begin on Monday. Even without any substantive bilateral engagement for a decade, India and Pakistan have regularly seen their officials visiting each other’s country for SCO-related exercises and Jaishankar himself travelled to Pakistan in 2024 for the SCO heads of government meeting.However, the key question remains – even if it’s too early to ask – whether Modi will attend the summit in Islamabad next year. The SAARC summit process remains blocked because of the PM’s reluctance to travel to Pakistan and, barring a dramatic change in the situation, the PM is unlikely to visit Islamabad.
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According to Indian officials, any such change can only be effected by Islamabad through tangible and irreversible action against cross-border terrorism and UN-proscribed terror entities operating out of Pakistan. Government recently denied strongly that it is involved even in any track 2 dialogue with Islamabad.Pakistan had assumed presidency of the SCO at the Bishkek summit earlier this month. Modi said the same day in his address that countries that use terrorism as an instrument of state policy, providing shelter to terrorists, must be categorically told terrorism can never be a strategic asset for anyone.
