Jaishankar Rules Out Indo-Pak Bilateral On The Sidelines Of SCO Meeting In Pakistan, Said, "I Will Behave Myself"

India's External Affairs Minister Dr. Jaishankar has ruled out any bilateral meeting with his Pakistani counterpart during his travel to Pakistan to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Council of Heads of Government Summit in Islamabad on October 15 and 16.

New Delhi: India's External Affairs Minister Dr. Jaishankar has ruled out any bilateral meeting with his Pakistani counterpart during his travel to Pakistan to attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Council of Heads of Government Summit in Islamabad on October 15 and 16.

Addressing a gathering while he delivered the Sardar Patel lecture, Jaishankar said," I am scheduled to go to Pakistan the middle of this month, and that is for a meeting of the SCO Heads of Government... I'm not going there to discuss India-Pakistan relations. I'm going there to be a good member of the SCO but you know, since I'm a courteous and civil person, I will behave myself."

The official announcement was made on Friday by MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal. The last Indian External Affairs Minister to visit Pakistan was Sushma Swaraj. She had travelled to Islamabad in December 2015 to attend a conference the 'Heart of Asia' conference on Afghanistan.

Pakistan had extended an invitation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi in August to attend the SCO summit.

Jaishankar’s visit to Pakistan assumes significance as it is seen as a major decision on New Delhi’s part.

To a question on revival of another regional bloc SAARC (South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation) of which India and Pakistan are primary members, the minister reiterated India's position that 'talks and true don't go hand in hand'.

"At the moment, SAARC is not moving forward. We have not had a meeting of SAARC for a very simple reason, that there is one member of SAARC (Pakistan) who is practicing cross-border terrorism, at least against one more member of SAARC (India), maybe more."

"If this kind of terrorism goes on so openly, it actually poses a challenge for us that do you ignore it and go ahead and in which case you are normalising it, you are accepting that this is a legitimate tool of statecraft," he explained that India will not accept Pakistan using terrorism as an instrument of state policy.

"At some point we came to the decision that we should not do this, that terrorism is something which is unacceptable, and if, despite a global view of it, if one of our neighbours continues to do it, then there must be a cost. It cannot be business as usual in the south, and that is the reason why, actually, SAARC meetings have not happened in recent years," he added.

But, he also went on to explain that SAARC in no way has held up regional cooperation. Enumerating the projects and deals that India has had with other South Asian partners, he said, "I want to make an equally important point, because SAARC has not happened doesn't mean regional activities have not happened. In fact, I would argue that the last five or six years, we have seen far more regional integration in the Indian subcontinent."

"And we have seen since the partition of India that, if you look today with Bangladesh, with Nepal, with Bhutan, with Myanmar, with Sri Lanka, you have railway lines being restored. You have roads being rebuilt. You have electricity grids are being built...I actually would say that what is happening in the neighbourhood, and it's happening because we are espousing this policy called neighbourhood first," he added.