Leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) including China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan gathered in Tashkent to discuss the further activities of the organisation. The summit events began today with grand concert programme, in which the Heads of the SCO countries were present and the official talks will be held on June 17.

Representatives of the Afghanistan?s interim Government will also be attending the summit. It is expected that during the meeting Afghanistan will be invited to join the Organisation as an observer. One of the main goals of the summit is to determine the major directions and the character of the SCO activity for short and middle term perspectives on the basis of the fundamental tendencies and new realities of the international development.

With the SCO emerging as a promising regional structure there is need to embark on a fundamentally new level of cooperation between the member countries to counter international terrorism, extremism, separatism and drug trafficking. During the summit leaders of the SCO countries exchange with views on these matters too. Particular attention is devoted to establishing political and legal platform for the cooperation in these fields.

For this purpose, a special program for the period of 2004-2006 and the Treaty on cooperation to combat the illegal flow of drugs, psychotropic substances and their derivatives will be adopted during the summit.

Tashkent summit of the SCO also evaluates the growing role of the Central Asian region in the new architecture of international security and global politics and accordingly determines the follow up measures to meet the present demands.

A number of other important topics are also on the agenda including determination of the political role of the SCO in resolving the Afghan issues and Afghanistan?s involvement into the processes of regional development and cooperation, and also development the Organization?s approach towards the formation of new geopolitics of transport communications in Central Asia.

Two-day-summit is expected to result in endorsing numerous important agreements and documents. In particular, Tashkent Declaration on the outcomes of the session of the Council of Heads of the SCO States, Convention on privileges and immunities of the SCO, Agreement between the SCO member countries to combat illegal flow of drugs, psychotropic substances and their precursor, Agreement on data bank of Regional Counterterrorism Structure of SCO and others.