THE six member countries of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization have vowed to enhance international information security and eliminate possible dangers of using information and communication technologies for criminal or terrorist purposes.

The heads of state of Kazakhstan, China, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan signed a statement on international information security yesterday during the summit.

They believe information technologies have opened up huge potentials for human development but there is a possible danger for the technologies to be used for criminal, terrorist, military or political purposes that run counter to the maintenance of international security.

The negative impact of using information and communication technologies in a destructive way by criminals "may cause a catastrophe for the entire world tantamount to that resulted from the use of weapons of mass destruction," reads the statement, which was signed by Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev, President Hu Jintao, Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev, Russian President Vladimir Putin, Tajik President Emomali Rakhmonov and Uzbek President Islam Karimov.

They said that it is imperative for all countries to step up their efforts on information security through bilateral, regional and international cooperation.

"Only with well-coordinated and complementary measures taken by all the countries, can the current challenges and threats to information security be effectively dealt with," they said in the document.

The six countries have decided to establish an expert group amongst themselves to formulate an action plan for international information security and define ways to solve relevant problems.