The forthcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit of Heads of State, to be held in Uzbekistan, will ensure that the multilateral body is not just expanded but that the Eurasian region acquire a new strategic dimension, said Dilshod Akhatov, Ambassador of Uzbekistan to India.
In an interview to ThePrint, the Uzbek envoy said Tashkent is looking at tapping the “full potential of the SCO” even as the world undergoes a major geopolitical shift.
“Uzbekistan is interested in fully tapping the potential of the organisation in the new conditions of its evolution, first of all, by increasing the practical cooperation in promising areas that meet the vital interests of all participating countries,” Akhatov said.
This year, the SCO summit is scheduled to be held in Samarkand on 15-16 September. Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be attending it along with Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, among others.
“With rapid shifts in the foreign policies of member countries, the SCO is in demand now more than ever. This is because, now, all the member states want this particular multilateral platform to focus on the implementation of an open, pragmatic, broad-based, and mutually beneficial cooperation,” the Uzbek envoy stressed.
According to him, this year, the SCO is focussed on giving the Eurasian region a larger “strategic dimension”, while chalking out a new security order.
“The SCO has an enormous transport and transit potential that awaits its practical implementation. In the context of the diversification of global supply chains, the creation of new international rail and road corridors in Eurasia, along the East-West and North-South directions, is acquiring a strategic dimension,” he said.
The envoy added, “The relevance of SCO is especially growing against the backdrop of aggravated distrust and antagonistic moods in the world. There is, now, mutual understanding and a spirit of cooperation in Eurasia.”
At the end of this year’s summit in Samarkand, India will assume the SCO Presidency from September 2022 for one year till September 2023. In 2023, India will host the next SCO summit.