Pakistan to host SCO Summit in October, India, other member states to be invited
Pakistan on Thursday said it would host the SCO Heads of Government meeting in October and invite all heads of government of the member states of the grouping.
Foreign Office spokesperson Mumtaz Zahra Baloch said at the weekly press briefing that Pakistan, as the rotating Chairmanship of the SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG), would host the SCO Heads of Governments Meeting in October this year.
When asked if Pakistan would extend an invitation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi to visit and attend the Summit in Pakistan, Baloch replied, “The chairmanship belongs to Pakistan, so in our capacity as the chair, we will be extending invitations to all Heads of Government of SCO member states”.
“This conference will take place in person, and we hope and expect that all members of SCO will be represented at the Heads of Governments Meeting being held in October”, she said.
She added the October summit will be preceded by a Ministerial meeting and several rounds of Senior Officials meetings, focusing on the financial, economic, socio-cultural and humanitarian cooperation among the SCO member states.
Baloch also said that Pakistan would not become a part of any bloc in international politics as it believed in having good ties with all countries.
“I would first like to clarify that Pakistan has repeatedly said that we are not part of any bloc. We do not believe in bloc politics. We believe in good relations with all countries on the basis of mutual respect, mutual confidence and non-interference in each other’s domestic affairs”, she said.
She said Pakistan categorically rejects the baseless assertions made about Pakistan in the recent report on religious freedom released by the US Department of State and as a matter of principle, Pakistan opposes such unilateral reports that make observations on the internal affairs of sovereign states.
“We believe that International Religious Freedom cannot be viewed from the lens of any single country’s social and legal perspective”, it said.
It said unilateral reports assessing other countries’ human rights situations are not free from political bias and present an incomplete and distorted picture and the methodology adopted in preparing these reports and the mandate and expertise of its authors are not transparent.
“We strongly believe that each State itself has the primary responsibility to promote and protect the religious rights and freedoms of its nationals”, she said, adding that Pakistani citizens are entitled to the freedom of religion and belief under the law and as enshrined in Pakistan’s constitution.
She said that during the visit of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif to Tajikistan this week, the two sides signed the Pakistan-Tajikistan Strategic Partnership Agreement, which would be based on five pillars of bilateral cooperation, including political, trade and investment, energy and connectivity, security and defence, and people-to-people contacts.
It will include structured high-level dialogue at the leadership and Foreign Ministers’ level.
She termed the UN group report on Imran Khan as unwarranted and said, “I would like to underline that a report on any particular case is unwarranted when it lacks objectivity and is based on an incomplete and inaccurate understanding of Pakistan’s legal and judicial system”.
The report said that cases against Khan were politically motivated.