Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: Senate’s Standing Committee on Defence Production Chairman Abdul Qayyum said on Sunday that Pakistan’s membership of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) was a significant development in the changing geopolitical scenario.

“The SCO is an important forum and becoming of its full member especially when new alignments are being made at international level is a significant achievement for Pakistan,” he said. He also said that there would be economic as well as military benefits after joining the prestigious forum. He said that increased cooperation with the member states in diverse fields would help Pakistan in achieving sustainable prosperity and development.

He said that the status of full member of SCO would enable Pakistan to have a better and effective platform to fight the menace of terrorism, which was the greatest challenge for Pakistan. Terming the membership a success of Pakistan’s foreign policies, he said that it was another feature in the cap of the present government.

He said that ups and downs in international relations always remained part of foreign policies, but important thing was that Pakistan made remarkable achievements like getting of the GSP Plus status from the European Union, signing of CASA-1000 project with the Central Asian states, initiating of Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) gas pipeline and advancements in the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline.

Qayyum said that a remarkable $46 billion Chinese investment started pouring in Pakistan for different sectors specially energy and infrastructure development. With these achievements, he expressed confidence that Pakistan’s economy would soon be in a take-of position, leading to become an Asian Tiger. Pakistan would strengthen its relationship with SCO and to make its contribution for regional peace, stability and development as well as cooperate against terrorism and extremism, he said.