Foreign minister S Jaishankar on Saturday said Central Asia was “our extended neighbourhood”, while sharing a video of a band singing a popular Bollywood number at the end of the two-day conclave of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in Uzbekistan capital Tashkent.
Jaishankar tweeted: “Another reminder from SCO Tashkent why Central Asia is our extended neighborhood.”
Another reminder from SCO Tashkent why Central Asia is our extended neighborhood. pic.twitter.com/FrDJEYnUwF
— Dr. S. Jaishankar (@DrSJaishankar) July 30, 2022
The ensemble band in Uzbekistan belted out ‘Bol Radha Bol’ from the 1964 magnum opus Sangam directed by Raj Kapoor. It is well known that the Hindi film industry is popular in countries located in Central Asia, and a sizeable number of fans of old-school Bollywood.
At the conclave, Jaishankar made a strong case against terrorism and India’s “zero tolerance” in oblique remarks to Islamabad, and said there was an urgent need to address the global energy and food crisis caused by disruptions from the Covid-19 pandemic as well as the Ukraine conflict.
The major highlights of the deliberations included a decision to grant permanent membership of the bloc to Iran and make Egypt, Qatar and Saudi Arabia its dialogue partners. The foreign ministers from member countries China, Russia, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan also supported the applications of Bahrain and the Maldives for the status of SCO dialogue partners.
They also discussed preparations for the forthcoming SCO summit in Samarkand on September 15 to 16. The summit is expected to be attended by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chinese President Xi Jinping, Russian President Vladimir Putin and other leaders of the grouping.
The SCO is a key economic and security bloc and has emerged as one of the largest transregional international organisations. The grouping was founded at a summit in Shanghai in 2001 by the presidents of Russia, China, the Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. India and Pakistan became permanent members in 2017.
(With PTI inputs)
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