Leaders from China-Russia-backed international organization meet in Pakistan

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Leaders and top officials from an international group founded to counter Western alliances met in Pakistan's capital on Wednesday and called for enhanced cooperation in areas including security, trade, and health. They also called for boosting people-to-people contact and minimizing the impacts of climate change.

The meeting of the China- and Russia-founded Shanghai Cooperation Organization was held amid tight security in Islamabad, and attended by leaders including Chinese Premier Li Qiang, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin, Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar and the prime ministers of Kyrgyzstan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Mongolia.

SCO was founded in 2001 by China and Russia to counter Western alliances. Its members include Iran, India, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

The capital was virtually locked down as Pakistan deployed extra police and troops to ensure security, making it difficult even for ambulances to get around.

The SCO meetings came more than a week after two Chinese engineers were killed in a suicide bombing outside the airport in Karachi, the capital of southern Sindh province.

An outlawed separatist group, which opposes Chinese-funded projects in Pakistan, claimed responsibility for the attack. Thousands of Chinese are currently working on projects related to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, part of China’s Belt and Road Initiative, a global endeavor aimed at reconstituting the Silk Road and linking China to all corners of Asia.

In his remarks at the meeting, Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif called for expanding China’s Belt and Road Initiative and the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor, focusing on roads, railways, and digital infrastructure.

China is building power plants, roads, railroads and ports around the world under the Belt and Road Initiative, a major part of Chinese President Xi Jinping’s push for China to play a larger role in global affairs.

Sharif also called for a peaceful Afghanistan, and said its soil should not be used for violence against any country.

Sharif's remarks came amid a surge in violence in Pakistan, for which the government blames militants based in Afghanistan. Kabul has denied the charge, with Afghanistan's Taliban government saying it does not allow anyone to use its soil for violence against other countries.

In a joint statement, the SCO meeting said the heads of delegations have reaffirmed that the member states “intend to further develop cooperation in the spheres of politics and security, trade, economy, finance and investment, and cultural and humanitarian ties in order to build a peaceful, safe, prosperous and ecologically clean planet Earth to achieve harmonious coexistence of man and nature”.

It said leaders and officials from Belarus, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan had reaffirmed support for China's One Belt, One Road initiative.

The meeting also vowed “to cooperate on climate change and overcome its negative consequences.”

Sharif said the next meeting of SCO will be held in Russia in 2025.