Why in News:

• External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi will attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation Council of Foreign Ministers in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, for the first time since a proposed meeting between them in New York was cancelled.

Details:

• The SCO summit meet will come just ahead of a plenary session of the Financial Action Task Force in Orlando, U.S., which will deliberate on Pakistan’s grey-listing status on terror financing. At the SCO, Prime Minister Imran Khan and Prime Minister Modi will be face-to-face. the Pakistan government has “informally conveyed to India through China and Russia that the opportunity” of the SCO summit “could be utilised for a bilateral meeting between them”.

Post UN listing

• In the wake of the UN Security Council designation of Masood Azhar, New Delhi is watching closely to see what action Pakistan takes against the JeM chief
• The action will also decide whether Pakistan, which is facing a full financial scrutiny by the
• FATF, could be put on an even more restrictive “blacklist” at the Orlando meeting
• Dialogue between India and Pakistan has been called off since the Pathankot attack in January 2016. After the Uri attack in September 2016, India also called off its engagement with Pakistan at the SAARC summit, and tensions between the two countries have been at an all-time high since the Pulwama attack, and airstrikes on Balakot by the Indian Airforce.
• Pakistan has closed its airspace to flights from India, which has led to crores of Rupees in losses for airlines with several flights cancelled due to the long re-routes involved.

SCO:  

• Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) is a permanent intergovernmental international organisation aimed at Strengthening mutual trust and neighbourliness among the member states. Promoting their effective cooperation in politics, trade, the economy, research, technology and culture, as well as in education, energy, transport, tourism, environmental protection, and other areas. Making joint efforts to maintain and ensure peace, security and stability in the region.
• Moving towards the establishment of a democratic, fair and rational new international political and economic order.
• The genesis of the SCO can be traced to the Shanghai Five mechanism created in 1996 of which the China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan were members. Later Uzbekistan was admitted to the grouping. In 2001 the declaration of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation was signed. In 2015 India and Pakistan were admitted to the grouping and they joined the grouping officially in 2017.