Aamir Latif
01 September 2025•Update: 01 September 2025
KARACHI, Pakistan
Pakistan's Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Monday said that Islamabad wants "normal" and "stable" ties with "all neighbors," calling for a "comprehensive and structural dialogue" to discuss all outstanding disputes.
Addressing the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) Summit in China's northern port city of Tianjin, Sharif said Islamabad seeks dialogue and diplomacy over "conflict and confrontation.”
“We will continue our efforts, along with all SCO members and the Chairman of the SCO (China), to promote progress and prosperity in the entire region and to ensure lasting peace in South Asia,” he added.
Emphasizing that his country respects the sovereignty and integrity of all the SCO members and its neighbors, he said that Islamabad respects all international and bilateral treaties and expects similar principles to be followed by all bloc members.
"Uninterrupted access to due share of water as per existing treaties among SCO members will strengthen the SCO working smoothly and will support the achievement of broader goals for which the SCO was established,” Sharif went on to say.
His remarks were in an apparent reference to fellow SCO member India and its unilateral move to put a decades-long water sharing agreement - the Indus Waters Treaty - in abeyance, following an attack in Indian-administered Kashmir that killed 26 tourists in April.
"Pakistan has always believed in the power of multilateralism, dialogue, and diplomacy, and shunning unilateralism. And yet, to our shock and deep disappointment, the region witnessed extremely disturbing developments during the last few months," he maintained.
Sharif also condemned Israel’s deadly attacks on Iran in June this year and its “heart-wrenching bloodshed in Gaza.”
“Israel’s unjustified aggression against our fellow brotherly member country Iran, a fellow SCO state, is condemnable and therefore unacceptable,” he observed.
“The suffering and starvation unfolding in Gaza is a festering wound on our collective conscience. We reiterate our call for an immediate end to gruesome violence and heart-wrenching bloodshed in Gaza,” the premier said.
He reiterated Islamabad's support for the UN-mandated two-state solution, with pre-1967 borders and East Jerusalem as the capital of an independent Palestinian state.
