India Seeks Full SCO Member Status

New Delhi, Sept 14, IRNA - India on Friday sought full member status of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), saying it was keen to deepen security-related cooperation with the six-nation grouping, particularly its anti-terror mechanism. Addressing the SCO Summit in Bishkek, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid reiterated India’s readiness to play a larger role in SCO as a full member, once the organization reaches consensus on its expansion, pti reported. It is our conviction that an expanded SCO will be a more effective body to address the numerous security and developmental challenges that our region faces, he said. India is also keen to deepen its security-related cooperation with the SCO and its Regional Anti-Terrorism Structure (RATS) in particular, Khurshid said. We look forward to the signing of the Model Protocol of Intent in the near future as a demonstration of our willingness and commitment, he said. India believes that only multilateral efforts and integrated actions can help effectively counter these negative forces, including drug trafficking and small arms proliferation, he said. Khurshid said, We believe that India can make deeper contributions to enrich the SCO process and contribute to its success. India has been an observer at the SCO since 2005 and has generally participated at the ministerial-level in summits. SCO focuses on security and economic cooperation in the Eurasian space. The precursor of the SCO was the Shanghai Five constituted by China in 1996 to address border security issues with four of its neighbors. In its present form, SCO was founded at a summit in Shanghai in 2001 by the presidents of Russia, China, Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. At the 2005 Astana Summit, India, Iran and Pakistan were admitted as observers. The Tashkent SCO Summit in June 2010 lifted the moratorium on new membership, paving the way for expansion of the regional grouping./end