The Pakistani Ambassador to China sang the praises of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), saying the organization works as a ballast for peace, security and stability in the region.
Masood Khan was speaking ahead of Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari’s visit to China, where he will attend the SCO leaders’ summit, next week.
“It is not a security organization in the traditional sense and has no military arm,” Khan said. However, the SCO has worked hard to ensure security and fight against transnational crime, and the “three evil forces” of terrorism, separatism and extremism by tackling the root causes through promoting economic development, economic cooperation, infrastructure development, and raising the people’s standard of living collectively, he said.
Khan added that the performance of the SCO over the past decade has been “outstanding” and has become a new paradigm and a new model for regional cooperation.
Speaking of his country’s role within the SCO, Khan explained that Pakistan has been an observer state since 2005 and has been actively participating in various conferences and events organized by the body.
He also promised Pakistan would play a “very constructive and effective” role in the organization and would devote all its energy to building peace. He said Pakistan has expressed its strong desire to become a full member and submitted the application.
The ambassador also talked about Pakistan’s relationship with China and described China as Pakistan’s “trusted strategic partner.”
Pakistan is satisfied with the continued flow of high-level exchanges between the two countries, and will try to further its economic cooperation with China in areas such as energy, infrastructure and agriculture, according to Khan.
He also urged the two nations to step up their people-to-people exchanges, especially among the younger generation to promote mutual understanding between the two countries. He said that learning Chinese is becoming very popular in Pakistan, where there is also growing demand for more Confucius Institutes.
“Recently, China’s ministry of education has approved setting up a Confucius Institute in Karachi University… I hope there will be more of such institutes to promote understanding of Chinese culture and help people learn the Chinese language,” he added.
The SCO was founded in Shanghai on June 15, 2001, and currently has six full members including China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Mongolia, Iran, Pakistan and India are its four observer states.
