Alwaght-The leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) countries have signed a joint declaration at their summit in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.
On Friday, they condemned terrorism in all its forms and called on the international community to promote cooperation in combating this threat. The eight heads of SCO member states also urged the global community to work towards a consensus on adopting the Comprehensive Convention on International Terrorism (CCIT).
The leaders also jointly noted that “interfering in other countries’ domestic affairs under the pretext of fighting terrorism and extremism, as well as using terrorist, extremist and radical groups to achieve one’s own mercenary ends, is unacceptable.”
The SCO member states emphasized the “unacceptability of attempts to ensure one country's security at the expense of other counties' security and noted that the unilateral and unlimited buildup of missile defense systems by certain countries or groups of states was detrimental to international security and a destabilizing factor in the world”.
The heads of the member-states reviewed the implementation of the results of the 2018 Qingdao summit and the priority goals for SCO development in the context of current global political and economic processes.
“The Member States emphasized that the Shanghai Cooperation Organization is an effective and constructive mechanism for multilateral cooperation that plays an important role in maintaining regional peace and stability and in facilitating the prosperity and development of the Member States,” the declaration said.
Four heads of SCO observer states, including Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, also participated in the summit.
In his address to the summit, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that his country will pay a particular attention to deepening of cultural and humanitarian ties during its SCO chairmanship.
“In particular, we will focus on implementation of the reached agreements on cooperation in mass media, physical education, sport and tourism,” he said.
Formed in April 1996, the SCO is a China-led political, economic and security bloc comprising eight members -- China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, India and Pakistan.
The SCO has four observer states namely Afghanistan, Belarus, Iran and Mongolia.
The SCO also recognizes six "dialogue partners”. They are -- Armenia, Azerbaijan, Cambodia, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Turkey -- the only NATO member in the group.
