SAMARKAND, September 15. /TASS/: The Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) needs to be strengthened as a platform for constructive interaction, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping on the sidelines of an SCO summit on Thursday.
"We are going to take part in a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization’s Council of Heads of State tomorrow. I would like to point out that it will be held in person for the first time after a three-year hiatus during the pandemic. It is particularly important today as our goal is to fully strengthen the SCO as a platform for constructive and creative interaction," Putin stated.
According to him, the organization brings together countries of different civilizations and cultures, who have different foreign policy priorities and national development models. "However, efforts to build our work on the principles of equality and mutual benefit, respect for each other’s sovereignty and non-interference in the domestic affairs of others made it possible for us to turn this organization into an effective mechanism of multilateral cooperation in a short period of time in historical terms," the Russian president emphasized, adding that the SCO was the largest multinational organization that united about half of the world’s population.
Putin was also confident that his meeting with Xi Jinping would give more impetus to the Russian-Chinese strategic partnership on bilateral and international levels.
