Rajya Sabha MP Kapil Sibal responded to External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar’s upcoming visit to Pakistan, where he will lead the Indian delegation at the SCO Summit 2024.

In a social media post, Sibal shared “just a thought” and asked what India had gained and what Pakistan had lost.

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“Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Invitation to Heads of Government Jaishankar to go to Islamabad First visit after 9 years Just a thought: What has India gained? What has Pakistan lost?” he questioned.

“I don’t have an answer!” he said.

MEA said on Friday that External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar will be travelling to Pakistan to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit scheduled to take place in October.

On being asked about India’s participation in the upcoming SCO Summit, the MEA Spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said, “EAM Jaishankar will lead a delegation to Pakistan to participate in the SCO summit which will be held in Islamabad on October 15-16.” 

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In August, Pakistan invited India to the in-person meeting of the SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG). During a media briefing on August 30, spokesperson Jaiswal confirmed this invitation from Islamabad.

When asked about it, he said, “Yes, we have received an invitation to the Council of Heads of State Government meeting (SCO). We don’t have any updates yet but will inform you about the situation later.”

Additionally, in May 2023, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari visited India for the SCO meeting in Goa, marking the first visit by a Pakistani Foreign Minister to India in six years.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation is a permanent intergovernmental international organisation established on June 15, 2001, in Shanghai by Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan.

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Its predecessor was the Shanghai Five mechanism. SCO countries currently include nine member states: India, Iran, Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan.

The SCO has three observer states: Afghanistan, Mongolia, and Belarus.

At the Samarkand SCO Summit in 2022, the process of raising the status of the Republic of Belarus within the Organisation to the level of a member state started. The SCO has 14 dialogue partners: Azerbaijan, Armenia, Bahrain, Egypt, Cambodia, Qatar, Kuwait, the Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and Sri Lanka.