The Indian Foreign Minister has three more bilateral meetings scheduled with his counterparts from Russia, China and Uzbekistan

Indian Minister of External Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar held a bilateral meeting with Secretary General of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Zhang Ming in Goa and lauded his "support for India's SCO Presidency".

"The meetings at the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers started with a productive interaction with Secretary General Zhang Ming. I appreciate his support for India's SCO Presidency," wrote the Indian foreign minister on his social media.

The two-day meeting of SCO Foreign Ministers began in Goa on Thursday, 4 May. Describing his interaction with Zhang Ming as "productive", Jaishankar said the Indian presidency was driven by "commitment to ensure security of the SCO".

According to the Indian Foreign Minister, the main focus areas of the SCO Council of Foreign Ministers are start-ups, traditional medicine, youth empowerment, science and technology.

The theme of India's SCO chairmanship in 2023 is "Secure-SCO". India attaches particular importance to the organisation's role in facilitating multilateral political, economic and people-to-people interaction in the region.

Meanwhile, Jaishankar has three more bilateral meetings scheduled today with his counterparts from Russia, China and Uzbekistan.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov has already arrived in Goa for the two-day meeting of foreign ministers.

The Foreign Ministers of China and Pakistan are also among those who will attend the meeting in person. The ministers will discuss a number of important geopolitical issues such as economic cooperation among SCO members and regional security.

This is the second time Lavrov is visiting India this year. He had earlier attended the G20 Foreign Ministers' meeting in New Delhi in March this year.

The Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) is an inter-governmental organisation established in 2001. Its members are Russia, India, China, Pakistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan and Iran.

At the SCO summit in Samarkand in 2022, India assumed the rotating presidency of the SCO.

The meeting of Foreign Ministers is one of several significant SCO events the country is hosting this year. All SCO members have received formal invitations and the foreign ministries of China, Pakistan and Russia have confirmed participation in the summit, as reported by ANI, a partner of TV BRICS.

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