DUSHANBE, July 9, Asia-Plus — Tajikistan’s Foreign Minister Hamrokhon Zarifi has participated at the regular meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization MFA Council in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, according to Tajik MFA.
Information posted on the MFA website said that foreign ministers of China (Yang Jiechi), Kazakhstan (Marat Tazhin), Kyrgyzstan, (Ednan Karabayev), Russia (Sergey Lavrov), Tajikistan (Hamrokhon Zarifi), and Uzbekistan (Vladimir Norov) as well as the SCO Secretary General Bolat Nourgaliyev and the SCO Regional Antiterrorist Structure Executive Committee Director Myrzakhan Subanov had attended the meeting that had been preparation for the SCO summit in Bishkek in mid-August.
The meeting participants have exchanged views on deepening cooperation among SCO member nations in all fields and regional issues of common concern.
According to Russia’s Itar Tass, Kyrgyz Foreign Minister Ednan Karabayev said that the SCO foreign ministers had approved the agenda of the upcoming summit of the organization and documents for signing. He said the key event of the summit that is to be held in Kyrgyzstan’s capital would be the signing of a long-term partnership and cooperation agreement. “It will consolidate the trustful and partner character of the relations within the framework of the SCO,” Karabayev said. He stressed that the SCO is an organization of a new type that is called to “play an important role in ensuring security”.
Karabayev also said that the foreign ministers called for development of partnership with countries that have an observer status in the SCO and for the broadening the dialogue in the contacts group SCO-Afghanistan.
The ministers agreed that the SCO has a real possibility of “influencing unstable points in the region”.
The SCO is transforming into an organization with a strong economic potential. Trade between SCO countries reached 50 billion dollars last year.
During the meeting it was noted that the SCO should activate cooperation with CIS states, ASEAN and the Euro-Asian Economic Community. It should also effectively use its status in the UN General Assembly.
“The SCO is set to constructively interact with all interested multilateral associations and states on the basis of the principles of equality and norms of international law,” the final document of the Bishkek meeting of foreign ministers says.
The document stresses “importance of work to form mechanisms of interaction with international partners, including in the Regional Antiterrorist Structure”.
