Indian Foreign Minister Jaishankar to visit Pakistan on Oct.15 for SCO summit

Indian Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will visit Pakistan to participate in the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit this month, the Indian foreign ministry spokesman said on Friday.

The visit will be the first by an Indian foreign minister to Pakistan in nearly a decade and will take place at a time when relations between the two countries have been strained over the Kashmir dispute.

Indian foreign ministry spokesperson Randhir Jaiswal said Jaishankar will lead the Indian delegation to Pakistan for the summit of Eurasian leaders on Oct.15 and 16 but did not say if he would meet any Pakistani leaders on the sidelines.

Earlier this year, Jaishankar said that India would want to "find a solution to the issue of years-old cross-border terrorism" but added that it cannot be the "policy of a good neighbour."

The last high-level visit between the two countries took place in May 2023 when Bilawal Bhutto Zardari, Pakistan's foreign minister at the time, attended the SCO foreign ministers' meeting in India's coastal state of Goa.

While Bilawal did not meet any Indian leaders, he and Jaishankar used the forum to trade blame for their frosty ties.

Reuters