People of Jammu and Kashmir are hopeful: National Conference on EAM Jaishankar's Pak visit

Jaishankar will lead the Indian delegation at the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Council of Heads of Government meeting in Pakistan's capital Islamabad on October 15-16.

The NC spokesperson also expressed hope that the visit will "break the ice," referring to the frosty relations between two nuclear-armed countries.

"It is a good beginning. It is after nine years that External Affairs Minister is going to Pakistan. It is something that probably the sub-continent is happy. I am very hopeful, especially the people of Jammu and Kashmir are hopeful that this will break the ice and this will be start of a new dawn," Tanvir Sadiq said.

"I hope they talk about all issues between India and Pakistan and there is something that goes beyond just mere rhetoric. The people of Jammu and Kashmir are hopeful that differences are resolved and there is some resemblance of normalcy between the two countries, "Sadiq added.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is a permanent intergovernmental international organization established on June 15, 2001, in Shanghai by Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Its predecessor was the mechanism of the Shanghai Five.

Currently, the SCO countries include nine Member States -- India, Iran, Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. The SCO has three Observer States - Afghanistan, Mongolia and Belarus.

At the Samarkand SCO Summit in 2022, the process of raising the status of Belarus within the Organization to the level of a member state started. The SCO has 14 Dialogue Partners - Azerbaijan, Armenia, Bahrain, Egypt, Cambodia, Qatar, Kuwait, Maldives, Myanmar, Nepal, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Turkiye and Sri Lanka.

Pakistan, which holds the rotating chairmanship of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), is scheduled to host the SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG) in Islamabad for October this year.

Earlier in August, India received an invitation from Pakistan for the SCO Council of Heads of Government (CHG) in-person meeting. While addressing a briefing in August, MEA spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal, confirmed the invitation by Islamabad for the SCO meeting. (ANI)