Rajnath heads for Kyrgyz Republic to attend SOC meeting

Mukesh Ranjan

Tribune News Service

New Delhi, August 23

Union Home Minister Rajnath Singh is leaving on Wednesday for a three-day visit to Kyrgyz Republic, where he will attend the 9^th meeting of Heads of Government Authorities of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) member states.

In a statement the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said, the two-day meeting of the SOC member states will be held on August 24-25 during which the delegates will discuss issues relating to prevention and elimination of emergency situations.   

According to officials in the MHA, the meeting will consider and approve the draft Action Plan for 2018-2019 for the implementation of the agreement between the governments of the SCO member states on cooperation in providing assistance in the elimination of emergency situations.

Singh will lead the Indian delegation comprising senior officers from the MHA, the National Disaster Management Authority (NDMA) and the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA).

India got the full membership of SCO this year and Prime Minister Narendra Modi had attended the SOC’s annual summit meeting held in Astana, Kazakhstan in June this year.

The MHA statement said: “The participation of India as SCO member will open the additional opportunities for giving new impetus to the development of international cooperation in the field of protecting the population and territories from emergency situations within the framework of the SCO and will bring in qualitatively new positions in regional and global formats.”

During the visit, Singh is likely to have bilateral meetings with the Ministers of some of the SCO member states, it added.