PM Shehbaz heads to China tomorrow for SCO Summit

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif will embark on a five-day visit to China from August 30 to September 4 to participate in the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Council of Heads of State Summit in Tianjin.

According to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MOFA), the invitation was extended by Chinese President Xi Jinping, with whom the Pakistani premier will hold bilateral talks, alongside meetings with Premier Li Qiang.

Discussions will cover the full spectrum of Pakistan-China cooperation, including Phase-II of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), trade, investment, and regional developments.

PM Shehbaz is also scheduled to address a Pakistan-China B2B Investment Conference in Beijing and interact with leading Chinese business executives.

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During the trip, he will join President Xi and other visiting leaders at a grand military parade in Beijing marking the 80th anniversary of the end of World War II.

The visit underscores the “All-Weather Strategic Cooperative Partnership” between Pakistan and China and is part of regular leadership-level exchanges.

Other leaders traveling to China

Meanwhile, the Kremlin confirmed that Russian President Vladimir Putin will travel to China from August 31 to September 3, attending the SCO summit and later joining the Tiananmen Square parade as Xi’s “main guest,” seated to the Chinese president’s right.

North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un is expected to sit on Xi’s left, while Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan will also attend the summit.

Putin will hold bilateral meetings with several leaders, with three Gazprom-related agreements expected to be signed during the visit.

His delegation will include senior Russian officials, including Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and Defence Minister Andrei Belousov.

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China, Russia, and other SCO members are expected to use the summit to project non-Western models of regional cooperation at a time of shifting global alignments.