Visit by Iranian leader defended
Beijing says the decision was based on consensus in Central Asia group
Beijing has defended its decision to invite Iran's president to the annual summit meeting of a regional grouping in Shanghai next week after US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said at the weekend he found it strange to bring the 'leading terrorist nation in the world into an organisation that says it's against terror'.
Confirming Beijing's invitation to Tehran, Shanghai Co-operation Organisation secretary-general Zhang Deguang also said the five-year-old body had no intention of evolving into a military alliance similar to Nato.
Mr Zhang, China's former ambassador to Russia, said the Chinese decision to invite Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad to the summit as an observer was based on the consensus of all the members of the organisation.
The organisation has six full members: China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. Iran, India, Pakistan and Mongolia have observer status.
'Given that it is a celebratory summit, we have decided to invite the leaders of all the observers of the group,' Mr Zhang said.
He played down American concerns about Iran's involvement in the body, saying the observers did not participate in decision-making. He said China and the other member countries, unlike the US, did not consider Iran a terrorist state.
'We can't agree to listing Iran, an observer of the organisation, as a supporter of terrorism,' he said. 'If we have indisputable evidence that a country supports terrorism, we wouldn't accept it as our observer.'
Mr Zhang said the summit on June 15 would not touch on Iran and Pakistan's contentious bids to become full members of the body.
He denied accusations that China wanted to develop the body, a major forum for Beijing to extend its influence in the Central Asian region, into another Nato.
'It is definitely groundless to view the body as a Nato in the east,' Mr Zhang said. 'We will not evolve into a closed political and military bloc and we are not an anti-US club or anti-western alliance.'
The group focused on 'new challenges and new threats in the post-cold war period', such as the battle against terrorism, religious extremism, drug trafficking and regional security, he said, adding that members would hold anti-terrorism drills in Russia next year.
Mr Zhang said the organisation's members had increased mutual understanding over the years, and would enhance trade and energy co-operation and play a bigger role in maintaining regional peace and stability in the future.
'We sowed seeds in the past five years and we are expecting a harvest in the next five years,' he said.
