Putin to meet Iran's President Rouhani at SCO summit next week

MOSCOW - Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to meet with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani at the forthcoming summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), a Kremlin spokesman said Thursday.

"Actually, we are preparing (for) such meeting," Dmitry Peskov, the press spokesman for the President of Russia, told reporters.

The 15th meeting of the Council of Heads of State of the SCO is scheduled to be held in the Russian city of Ufa from July 9-10.

The SCO now groups China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan as member states, with Afghanistan, India, Iran, Mongolia and Pakistan as observers and Belarus, Turkey and Sri Lanka as dialogue partners.