The sixth summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) was held in the port city of Shanghai in eastern China on Thursday.
The SCO summit was attended by senior officials of Iran, China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan and Mongolia.
A high-ranking Indian delegation as well as representatives of the United Nations and Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) also participated in the summit.
The sixth SCO summit has attracted the attention of world media due to regional and international issues including the opposition of China and Russia to the US intervention in the summit to prevent Iran from attending it as well as the growing role of the organization in regional developments following membership of Iran, Pakistan, India and Mongolia in it as observers.
The US plot to prevent invitation of Iran to the summit and President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad'a participation in it failed. According to a joint communique issued at the end of the event and the importance given to Iran and the SCO observer states by the organization's heads of states, SCO is expected to become one of the greatest world bodies.
The recent remarks by US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld in Singapore about SCO and Iran's membership in it proves that Washington views the organization as against its goals.
Following acceptance of Iran, Pakistan, India and Mongolia as SCO observers in 2004, the total area of its member states was increased to 37 million square kilometers with a population of 2.7 billion, about 40 percent of the world's total population and a great part of the two continents of Asia and Europe.
The common views of SCO member and observer states on many regional and international matters such as opposition to a unipolar world and unilateralism account for their close bonds so that experts say that the organization is expected to become a global power.
Though the views and ideologies of its official and observer members are in conflict, irrespective of such conflict they have chosen to move along the same path.
In their joint communique, the SCO member states underlined the importance of dialogue, respecting the diversity of civilizations and the independence of all countries.
The participants warned against interference in the internal affairs of other countries under the pretext of discord on the ruling systems as well as political, cultural and social values, given that cooperation will facilitate security challenges.
In addition, consensus and dialogue among civilizations will thwart threats.
Though the SCO member and observer states follow one of the four ideologies, -- Bhudism in China and Mongolia, Orthodox church in Russia, Hinduism in India, Islam in Iran and Pakistan -- the final communique shows that the indicated states agree to respect one another's various civilizations, cultures and ideologies, display an example of accord and turn this significant region of the world into a stable, secure and peaceful one in the present century.
The Shanghai Cooperation Organization is an inter-governmental organization founded in Shanghai on June 15, 2001 by six countries including China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
As per the SCO charter and declaration establishing the organization, its main purposes are strengthening mutual trust and good neighborliness and friendship among member states and developing effective cooperation in the political, economic, trade, scientific, technological, cultural, educational, energy, transportation and environmental protection fields.
The organization further aims to urge member states to work together to maintain regional peace, security and stability and encourage creation of a new international political and economic order anchored on the principles of democracy, justice and rationality.
