Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be participating in the 18th Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit, being held under the chairmanship of Chinese President Xi Jinping, on June 9 and 10, in Qingdao, Shandong province. On the sidelines, he will hold a bilateral meeting with Xi on Saturday, just over a month after the two leaders held an informal summit in the Chinese city of Wuhan.
Modi will attend the SCO heads of states meeting in both the restricted as well as the extended formats, a Ministry of External Affairs official said, adding that bilateral meetings of the prime minister were also planned on the sidelines of the summit. Pakistan President Mamnoon Hussain will also participate in the summit. Modi is expected to hold nearly half a dozen bilateral meetings with leaders of other SCO countries. However, there is no official word on whether there will be any interaction between Modi and Pakistan President.
Modi and Xi are expected to take stock of the implementation of decisions taken at the informal summit just over a month ago in Wuhan. Among other issues, the SCO summit is expected to focus on opportunities for cooperation among the member countries and the situation in the region, External Affairs Ministry spokesman Raveeh Kumar said.
Russian President Vladimir Putin is also expected to attend the summit. Modi had last month met Putin in an informal summit in Sochi.
The SCO was founded at a summit in Shanghai in 2001 by the presidents of Russia, China, Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. India and Pakistan became its members last year, and are participating as full members for the first time.
The summit also offers challenge for Modi, as the SCO members are expected to strongly endorse China's Belt Road Initiative (BRI). Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi last week said that the Qingdao summit will lay out new plans to enhance the synergy of development strategies of member states, especially promoting the construction of the belt and road to lift regional economic cooperation. India is expected to be the only country in the Qingdao declaration to not endorse the BRI, as was the case at the recent SCO foreign ministers meet where the final statement awkwardly named the ministers of all countries, barring India, in the part of the statement that named the BRI.
