By IANS,
New Delhi: India is set to boost its strategic and economic ties with the six-nation Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) when Power Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde goes to Dushanbe, the Tajik capital, for the SCO summit Thursday.
“We attach considerable importance to our association with the SCO, which has emerged as an active and dynamic regional grouping,” the external affairs ministry said in a statement Tuesday.
“Within the existing participatory mechanisms open to the observer countries, India has demonstrated its strong commitment to the SCO by engaging actively in several areas related to development and security,” the ministry said.
India is an observer at the six-nation SCO that includes Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Russia has strongly backed India’s full membership in the SCO.