Full membership status: SCO to begin negotiations with Pakistan, India, Iran on June 15

The Shanghai Co-operation Organisation (SCO) will start negotiations with Pakistan, India and Iran for their full membership after a memorandum is expected to be passed at its summit in June, SCO Secretary-General Muratbek Sansyzbayevich Imanaliev has said in Beijing. He also confirmed Afghanistan's application for observer status, saying that it "is being studied and will be discussed at the upcoming summit".
The summit, to be held on June 15 in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan, will pass a memorandum on the obligations of membership applicants, the China Daily reported Imanaliev as saying on Thursday. After the adoption of the memorandum, "we can start negotiations with the nations applying to join the SCO", he said.
The SCO was an open organisation as defined in its charter, he said, noting that it was willing to cooperate with "organisations and nations that hold the same opinions as us". Founded in Shanghai in 2001, the SCO currently has six members-China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. India, Pakistan, Iran and Mongolia have observer status. Iran, Pakistan and India had applied to join the SCO as full members and that had been discussed within the organisation, he said.