MEA Explains India’s Decision to Decline Signing Joint SCO Statement in China

The ministry of external affairs on Thursday said that a joint statement will not be adopted at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) defence ministers meeting since views could not be agreed on especially with regard to the question of terrorism.

“We had our defence minister participating in the defence ministers' meeting of SCO. This meeting happened over two days, that is, yesterday and today. The defence ministers' meeting has concluded. I understand that they could not adopt a joint statement. I also understand that certain member countries could not reach consensus on certain issues, and hence, the document couldn't be formalised,” said MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.

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He also added that India had insisted that terrorism should be very strongly mentioned in the joint statement but this was not palatable to one country in particular.

“On our side, India wanted concerns on terrorism reflected in the document, which was not acceptable to one particular country, and therefore the statement…” Jaiswal said.

He continued adding the defence minister in his speech echoed that member states of the SCO should come together and combat terrorism in all its forms and manifestation.

“He (defence minister) also reiterated the need to uphold that the perpetrators, organisers, financers, and sponsors of reprehensible acts of terrorism, including cross-border terrorism, need to be held accountable,” Jaiswal said.

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Rajnath Singh: SCO represents 30% of global GDP, 40% of population

Addressing a meeting of defence ministers of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), Rajnath Singh emphasised on the relevance of the SCO in a more uncertain world, Singh said that around 30 per cent of the world GDP is in SCO and out of 7.5 billion people in the world about 40 per cent are in SCO.

He referred to the safety, security and stability of the region as a common duty that can foster progress and enhance lives of nations within the member states.

Singh also focused on the emerging issues regarding transnational terrorism, cyber threats and hybrid warfare. He emphasized on the necessity to neutralize the superior technologies that the terrorists are utilizing such as the drones to cross borders to traffic in weapons and drugs.

An advocate in implementing a reform of the multilateral frameworks, the Defence Minister urged to learn to have more dialogue and to cooperate more with other nations so that conflicts can be avoided. No state can manage the problems by itself and the very idea of the global order or the process of multilateralism is developed on the premise of collective work to benefits all of us, he said.

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