Pakistan yet to decide on India's invitation to FM Bilawal to attend SCO meeting
The meeting of the SCO foreign ministers are expected to take place in the first week of May in Goa.
Islamabad, Jan 26: Pakistan is yet to decide India's invite to Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto Zardari to participate in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) ministerial meeting in Goa.
"Both Pakistan and India are members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization. SCO is an important transregional organization that aims to strengthen economic linkages and cooperation among its Member States in different fields. India is holding the rotating chairmanship of the SCO Council of Heads of State for the year 2022-2023," said Pakistan's Foreign Ministry's spokesperson.
"Every year, SCO develops a calendar of activities, which include the Meeting of the Foreign Ministers. In that capacity the chair extends invitation to all Member States. As in the past, these invitations are being processed as per standard procedures and a decision will be taken in due course," added the spokesperson.
Pakistan's Bilawal Bhutto Zardari and China's Qin Gang are among the foreign ministers of SCO member nations invited by India for a high-level meeting it is scheduled to host in May, people familiar with the matter said on Wednesday.
The meeting of the SCO foreign ministers are expected to take place in the first week of May in Goa.
India is the current chair of the eight-nation SCO.
If the Pakistani foreign minister decides to attend the meeting in person, then it will be the first such visit from Islamabad to India since 2011. The then Pakistani foreign minister Hina Rabbani Khar had visited India that year.
The ties between India and Pakistan came under severe strain after India's warplanes pounded a Jaish-e-Mohammed terrorist training camp in Pakistan's Balakot in February 2019 in response to the Pulwama terror attack.
The relations further deteriorated after India in August 2019 announced the withdrawal of Jammu and Kashmir's special powers and the bifurcation of the erstwhile state into Union territories.