Islamabad: Pakistan on Friday formally announced that the 19th SAARC Summit which was to be held in Islamabad in November this year has been cancelled.
A statement from the Foreign Office said that "the spirit of the SAARC Charter is violated when a member state casts the shadow of its bilateral problems on the multilateral forum for regional cooperation".

"Pakistan attaches great importance to regional cooperation under the umbrella of SAARC and remains committed to hosting the 19th SAARC Summit at Islamabad at the earliest," it added.
The statement also said that Pakistan deplores India's decision to impede the SAARC process by not attending it, which was slated for November 9-10.
"The decision by India to derail the Summit effectively contradicts Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi's own call to fight against poverty in the region," the statement said.

The Foreign Office said that a new set of dates for holding of the Summit in Islamabad will be announced soon, through the Chair of SAARC (Nepal).
Meanwhile, Islamabad Pakistan on Friday briefed envoys from the P5 states of the UN Security Council on the situation along the Line of Control in Jammu and Kashmir.
The Foreign Office spokesman said envoys from the US, Russia, China, France and Britain were briefed on fresh violations of the ceasefire agreement by Indian forces along the Line of Control (LoC).
The envoys were also apprised of Indian "atrocities and gross human rights abuses" in New Delhi-governed Jammu and Kashmir.
The briefing to the envoys came amid the growing tension between Pakistan and India.
New Delhi has claimed that it had launched surgical strikes on militant launch pads across the LoC. Pakistan has denied that any strike from the Indian side had taken place on its soil.