Astana, 15 Jul: With terrorism becoming a threat to regional and global peace, the perpetrators, facilitators, financiers and sponsors of heinous acts of terrorism \u201cneed to be identified and punished,\u201d External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has said, in a veiled jibe at Pakistan.
\nIn a recent interview with Astana-based Kazinform News Agency, he also emphasised that the “fight against the three evils — terrorism, separatism and extremism — is a priority in SCO (Shanghai Cooperation Organisation)”.
\nThe 24th Meeting of the SCO Council of Heads of State was held on July 4 in the Kazakh capital Astana, under the presidency of Kazakhstan. Jaishankar led the Indian delegation to the Summit.
\nPakistan Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also attended the summit.
\n\u201cThere is no doubt that the major challenge faced by the world today is terrorism. It has become a threat to regional and global peace, and it demands urgent action from all of us,\u201d he said.
\n\u201cCombating terrorism requires a very comprehensive approach – not just the perpetrators of heinous acts of terrorism, but the facilitators, financiers and sponsors of terrorism – they all need to be identified and punished,\u201d Jaishankar said.
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\nThe minister emphasised that he \u201cstrongly believes\u201d that SCO through the Regional Anti-Terrorist Structure (RATS) has a \u201creasonable standing\u201d to propose measures against terrorism in the region.
\nJaishankar said he is happy that Kazakhstan, during its chair, negotiated an updated programme to combat terrorism, separatism, and extremism, which was adopted at the Astana Summit, according to the transcript of the interview shared by the Ministry of External Affairs.
\nDuring the SCO New Delhi Summit last year, one of the two joint statements adopted was on ‘Countering Radicalisation leading to Terrorism, Separatism and Extremism,’ which included various elements of radicalisation \u2013 including ideology, media campaign, as well as radical and terrorist content on the internet, he said and added, \u201cKazakhstan, during their chairmanship, carried forward the spirit of that joint statement.\u201d
\n\u201cThe updated programme to combat terrorism, separatism and extremism is critical and timely. But I want to emphasise that what is more important is the actual implementation of the programme that we have now successfully drawn up, which includes an unambiguous commitment by all the Member States to getting rid of all forms and manifestations of terrorism in the region, including cross-border terrorism,\u201d the Minister said.
\nSpeaking about the importance and potential impact of the two significant initiatives, related to terrorism and the SCO Anti-Drug Strategy, adopted at the Astana Summit, Jaishankar said, \u201cDrug trafficking is another issue that we need to combat together, and is very closely related to two other issues in the region — terrorism and stability in Afghanistan.\u201d
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\n\u201cThere is a consensus on the establishment of an Anti-Drug Centre in Dushanbe. This is a welcome move and is much needed. The Anti-Drug Centre together with the proposed Universal Centre will be an effective weapon in combating drug trafficking,\u201d Jaishankar added.
\nThe Astana Declaration issued after the July 4 summit also said, \u201cThe Member States are unanimous in recognising the need to improve SCO mechanisms to counter security challenges and threats and expand specialised cooperation in the fight against terrorism, separatism and extremism, as well as drug trafficking, arms smuggling and other types of transnational organized crime.\u201d
\n\u201cToday, after decades of taking measures against terrorism in global forums, including through the UN Security Council, terrorism continues to be a threat to the region. The UN-designated terror outfits are still functioning in the region,\u201d he said, referring to wanted Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba terrorists like Hafiz Saeed receiving state support.
\nThe SCO 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 its permanent members in 2017. (PTI)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Astana, 15 Jul: With terrorism becoming a threat to regional and global peace, the perpetrators, facilitators, financiers and sponsors of heinous acts of terrorism \u201cneed to be identified and punished,\u201d External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar has said, in a veiled jibe at Pakistan. In a recent interview with Astana-based Kazinform News Agency, he also emphasised […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-244425","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-national"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=244425"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/244425\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=244425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=244425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/arunachaltimes.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=244425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}