India to stress on inclusive link amid China's BRI focus

Cooperation on de-radicalisation strategies will be the highlight of India's deliverables for the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit to be held under its presidency on July 4.

India, as the host of the summit, will also push for inclusive connectivity agreements - International North South Transport Corridor and Chabahar Port - even as China will harp on the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) as the Eurasian connectivity model, ET has learnt.

India, like previous years, may not sign to the reference of the BRI at the SCO joint communique given its longstanding reservations on the initiative that violates the country's sovereignty and pushes it towards a debt trap, it has been learnt.

In March this year, National Security Adviser Ajit Doval had told the SCO NSAs at a meeting that members of the group should respect territorial integrity and not seek unilateral military superiority in adjacent regions, taking a dig at China's actions along the Line of Actual Control and elsewhere in the periphery.

Without naming China, Doval had said, "The Charter calls upon member states to have mutual respect for sovereignty, territorial integrity of states and inviolability of state borders, non-use of force or threat of its use in international relations and seeking no unilateral military superiority in adjacent areas."

His remarks assume significance in light of India's consistent reservation to the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor as it passes through Pakistan-occupied Kashmir.

Among other security related issues that impact Eurasia, countering terrorism and stabilising Afghanistan will top the agenda of the virtual summit led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and attended by presidents of Russia, China, Iran and the Central Asia.