TASHKENT (Sputnik) — Uzbek President Islam Karimov said Friday that the negotiations on accession of India and Pakistan to the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) were "complicated."
"I will not conceal, the process of negotiations [on accession of India and Pakistan] was of rather hard and complicated nature. It should be accepted. But at least we succeeded at overcoming all the difficulties and coming to a single opinion, adhering to common strategic aims and SCO tasks," Karimov said.
He added that the accession of both Islamabad and New Delhi to the SCO would be a landmark event in the organization's history.
The SCO is a political, economic and military alliance that includes Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. India and Pakistan are expected to become full-fledged members at the 2017 SCO summit in Kazakhstan.
