External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar said he is visiting Pakistan only as a good member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) and will not hold any bilateral talks with the neighbouring country. Jaishankar took a veiled dig at Pakistan and said the neighbouring country was responsible for derailing SAARC.
Addressing presspersons, on travelling to Pakistan to attend SCO Summit, Jaishankar said, “It (visit) will be for a multilateral event. I'm not going there to discuss India-Pakistan relations. I'm going there to be a good member of the SCO.” The union minister who even recently lashed out against Pakistan said, “You know, since I'm a courteous and civil person, I will behave myself accordingly."
Jaishankar also held Pakistan responsible for derailing the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation(SAARC). “At the moment, SAARC is not moving forward, we haven't had a meeting of SAARC for a very simple reason - there is one member of SAARC who is practising cross-border terrorism at least against one more member of SAARC, maybe more,” Jaishankar charged.
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The union minister added, “Terrorism is something which is unacceptable and despite a global view of it if one of our neighbours continues to do it – there cannot be business as usual in SAARC. That's the reason why the SAARC meeting has not happened in recent years.”
Jaishankar is the first Indian foreign minister to visit Pakistan since December 2015. Sushma Swaraj was the last Indian foreign minister to visit Islamabad. Pakistan is hosting the SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG) meeting on October 15 and 16. External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal on Friday said, "The external affairs minister will lead our delegation to Pakistan to participate in the SCO summit which will be held in Islamabad on October 15 and 16.”