External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar to visit Pakistan to represent India at the SCO summit

The External Affairs Minister of India S Jaishankar will be visiting Pakistan in order to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit. The summit will be held in Islamabad on the 15th and 16th of October, said MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.

S Jaishankar will be the first External Affairs Minister to visit Pakistan in nine years. The country was last visited by Sushma Swaraj in 2015. Mr Jaiswal also mentioned that the visit will be limited only to attending the summit.

This decision of the central government to send Mr Jaishankar as the lead delegation to Pakistan is seen as a major step in building the relationship of both countries.

The member countries of SCO include India, China, Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. The SCO was founded at a summit in Shanghai in 2001. India became an observer country for the first time in 2005 but became a permanent member along with Pakistan in 2017.

India had hosted the SCO summit in virtual format in July 2023.