S Jaishankar Rules Out India-Pakistan Talks at SCO: ‘Will Behave Accordingly’

S Jaishankar India-Pakistan talks

S Jaishankar Rules Out India-Pakistan Talks at SCO: External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar on Saturday said he won’t hold talks with Pakistan during his visit to the country for SCO meet.

"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," he said at the sidelines of an event in the national capital.

"But, you know, since I'm a courteous and civil person, I will behave myself accordingly," he added.

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Jaishankar also took a jibe at Pakistan saying it was responsible for the derailment of 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... 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 - but it doesn't mean that the regional activities have stopped. In fact, in the last 5-6 years, we have seen far more regional integration in the Indian subcontinent," he added.

Jaishankar will be visiting Pakistan for SCO meet this month. This will be the first high level visit to the neighbouring country in 9 years.

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India will not hold bilateral talks with Pakistan till it stops breeding and fostering cross-border terrorism. India on Friday said the minister will visit Pakistan for SCO meet in mid October.

It will be the first time in nearly 9 years that India’s external affairs minister will visit Pakistan as the ties between the two neighbours are icy over cross-border terrorism.

Pakistan is hosting SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG) meet on October 15 and 16.

Swaraj was the last Indian external affairs minister to visit Pakistan. She had gone to Islamabad in December 2015 for a conference on Afghanistan.

The announcement was made by external affairs ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal.

"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," he said at his weekly media briefing.

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