Karimov, who is due to attend an SCO summit scheduled for June 15 in Shanghai, China, said the SCO, as a recognized international organization, had made great progress in various fields of cooperation with its significance and influence going beyond the region.

"The SCO has not only showed a vigorous vitality, but also been established as an international forum that can resolve regional issues, including cooperation in politics, security, economy and humanities," said the president.

He spoke of the development of and change in global situations, non-traditional threats to security, long-lasting "hotspots," danger posed by international terrorism, separatism and extremism, and drug-trafficking around the world, especially in central Asia.

All of the facts "have repeatedly indicated the timeliness and imminence of establishing and developing such international organizations as the SCO," Karimov said.

Karimov expressed his belief that there should be a wide prospect on the economic cooperation within the framework of the SCO.

When asked about measures taken by Uzbekistan to enhance and broaden cooperation with other SCO members, he said his country highly praised the cooperation among SCO members.

In the area of investment cooperation, Uzbekistan thinks the emphasis should be put on the fields such as the development of transportation and exploitation of rich water resource in the region.

Uzbekistan also put forward a series of proposals and took substantial measures to cope with terrorism, separatism and extremism in various forms, added Karimov.

He highlighted the important role played by the SCO's regional anti-terrorism body, established in 2004 to coordinate SCO members' anti-terrorist efforts.

In the field of humanities, Uzbekistan had paid more attention to the coordination in educational affairs, said the president.

"We welcome the agreement on educational cooperation within the framework of the SCO, which is to be signed during the summit in Shanghai," he said.

As for the SCO's prospects and the upcoming summit, Karimov said SCO members "have a lot of things to do" in such fields as economy and security because the organization was still at its initial stage of development.

He said more and more countries hoped to participate in the SCO's activities through various forms because of its rising political prestige, which proved that the organization had a promising prospect of development and became attractive to other nations.

Due to the rapid development of geopolitics and the globalization of economy and information, each cooperative mechanism of the SCO would be raised to a higher level, he said.

"I believe the commemorative summit can and should start a more effective approach that will jointly make use of opportunities and cope with current threats and challenges in the world," Karimov said.

Established in 2001, the SCO comprises China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan. In 2004 and 2005, it accepted Mongolia, Iran, Pakistan and India as observers.

The heads of state of the six SCO member countries will attend the summit meeting, along with observers and representatives from countries and international organizations that have established cooperative relations with the SCO.