Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif may meet Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit slated to be held in September. Shehbaz is also expected to meet other counterparts.
The summit is scheduled to take place in the historical city of Samarkand, Uzbekistan on September 15 and 16. PM Shehbaz is expected to meet the leaders of Russia, China and Iran at the summit.
Previously, Foreign Minister Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari had attended the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers Meeting in Tashkent last month.
The foreign minister had six bilateral meetings with foreign ministers of Central Asian states on the sidelines of the conference, which was serving as preparation for the SCO Heads of State meeting in September, which Prime Minister Shehbaz will be attending.
During the Council of Foreign Ministers Meeting, the FM had claimed that no meeting between the prime ministers of the neighboring countries of India and Pakistan was being scheduled.
“There are no plans of any meetings between Indian and Pakistani prime ministers in September,” Bilawal had said, asserting that India and Pakistan are both part of the SCO but will only be engaging in the broader context of the conference activities.
Bilawal added that following 2019 escalation of conflict between the two countries, constructive dialogue with India had become difficult and the recent rise of Islamophobia was making an already difficult task even more challenging.
