Prime Minister Narendra Modi will hold separate bilateral meetings with Chinese Premier Xi Jinping and Russian President Valdimir Putin at this year’s summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek this week, the Ministry of External Affairs has said.

The global economic scenario, specifically the trade frictions with the US, is likely to feature in the agenda for discussion.

“The SCO meetings are free and frank. One can expect participating leaders will highlight concerns uppermost in their mind. Multilateral economic engagement and current global scenario will be uppermost in their minds. It is up to the leaders of the different countries to highlight aspects important to them,” said A Gitesh Sarma, Secretary (West), Ministry of External Affairs, in a media briefing on Monday, when asked if the countries would discuss trade friction with the US.

The Chinese, who are caught in a bitter trade entanglement with the US, are more direct in their approach. Chinese Vice-Foreign Minister Zhang Hanhui said at a media briefing in his country that he China-US trade war and the “spectre” of emerging trade frictions between the US and India could become important part of the discussions between the two leaders.

With China determined not to have Pakistan named as the country supporting terrorism in the region, New Delhi has decided to talk about its concerns on terror and countries harbouring terrorists at the forum without directly naming its neighbour. “We will of course put forward our views and experiences in the area of terrorism and our concerns very strongly at the SCO meeting on June 13-14. But we don’t want to drag our squabbles there by naming any particular country,” an official who did not wish to be named told BusinessLine .

The SCO was founded in 2001 by the Presidents of Russia, China, Kyrgyz Republic, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan in a Summit meeting in Shanghai. India and Pakistan were granted permanent membership of the SCO in 2017.

India has been an observer at the SCO since 2005 and has participated in the ministerial-level meetings of the grouping that discuss economic and security issues.

comment COMMENT NOW