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Shanghai Group denounces misuse of anti-terror war

By Vladimir Radyuhin

MOSCOW MAY 29. In a veiled attack on the United States the leaders of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) denounced the misuse of anti-terror war to target any religion, country or ethnic group and threw their weight behind the United Nations.

The member-states of SCO haven consistently and invariably maintained that the fight against terrorism must be conducted on the basis of norms and principles of international law, (and) it cannot be equated with the fight against any religion, country or ethnic group, the leaders of the Shanghai regional security group said in a joint declaration adopted at a summit in Moscow on Thursday.

SCO, set up two years ago, unites Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

The Presidents of the six member-states today completed the institutionalisation of SCO, signing a host of documents establishing the organisation s apex and executive bodies — the councils of Heads of State, Heads of Government, Foreign Ministers, and other documents. It was decided that SCO s permanent bodies — a secretariat, based in Beijing, and a regional anti-terror structure, based in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, — will become operational by January 1, 2004. The SCO joint declaration stressed the fundamental importance of recognising the key role of the U.N. and its Security Council in resolving major international problems and called for compliance with the U.N. Charter and international law.

Our shared position is that there is no alternative to the U.N. as a universal organisation in the system of international relations, Russia's President, Vladimir Putin, said after the summit. It is only on the basis of international law that global stability can be achieved and local conflicts can be settled.

The SCO leaders called for reforming the U.N. to adapt it to the fast changing global situation and the need for effective solution of problems of global politics and security.

The key to resolving security problems lies in evolving under U.N. aegis a Global strategy of facing new challenges and threats, they said in the joint declaration.

The Shanghai group declared readiness to establish contacts with other international organisations and states irrespective of their geographic location and to participate in building a regional security system in cooperation with all countries and associations in the region.

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