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Iran inks commitment memorandum to join SCO

The document was signed by the head of the Iranian Foreign Ministry and the SCO secretary general

© Sergei Bobylev/TASS

SAMARKAND, September 15. /TASS/. Iran has signed a commitment memorandum with the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the press service of the SCO Summit reported on Thursday.

"Iran has signed a commitment memorandum in order to join the SCO, the document was signed by the head of the Iranian Foreign Ministry and the SCO secretary general," the statement reads.

In order to receive a status of a full-fledged member of the SCO, following the signing of the commitment memorandum, Iran has to ratify 40 normative documents of this organization, Uzbekistan’s SCO national coordinator Rahmatulla Nurimbetov said on Thursday.

"According to the SCO Charter and its other normative documents, any country candidate for membership in the organization must share the SCO’s goals and tasks without taking any hostile actions against other member states. Additionally, the country should be part of the Eurasian region and should not be subject to sanctions by the UN Security Council," the official told reporters. According to him, Iran complies with all these requirements, therefore the decision was made to launch the procedure of accepting this country to the SCO.

Nurimbetov specified that, following the signing of the commitment memorandum, "in all, Iran has to ratify more than 40 organization’s documents, after this, the full-fledged member status will be granted to the country." He reiterated that India and Pakistan had become full SCO members a year after signing the commitment memorandums. In his opinion, Iran might also need around one year in order to fulfill all the requirements. In this case, the country may accede to the SCO in 2023, at the organization’s next summit which will take place in India.

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