Press Briefing by Foreign Secretary on 2nd August 2006 in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Good evening to all of you. As you are aware, we have just concluded the 27th Session of the SAARC Council of Ministers and this meeting discussed some very important issues which have a long-term impact on the future of SAARC as a regional organization. The Council reviewed the progress of implementation of some major decisions which were taken at the 13th SAARC Summit, including some of the proposals which were made by Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh at that Summit.
Press Briefing by Foreign Secretary on 2nd August 2006 in Dhaka, Bangladesh
Good evening to all of you. As you are aware, we have just concluded the 27th Session of the SAARC Council of Ministers and this meeting discussed some very important issues which have a long-term impact on the future of SAARC as a regional organization. The Council reviewed the progress of implementation of some major decisions which were taken at the 13th SAARC Summit, including some of the proposals which were made by Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh at that Summit.
First of all, I would like to announce here that the dates for the 14th Summit which will be held in India have now been finalized. The Summit will be held in New Delhi on April 3 & 4, 2007. This will be preceded by the meetings of the Council of Ministers and, before that, the Standing Committee meeting and the Programming Committee meeting.
As a curtain raiser to the 14th SAARC Summit, the SAARC Car Rally which I had mentioned earlier in my press briefing, this has now been accepted by the SAARC Member countries. We have decided to set up an Organising Committee of representatives from all SAARC Member countries and India has offered to host the first meeting of this Organizing Committee. This will go into the details concerning the rally, viz. the route which would be taken, the financing of the rally, the arrange ments for the media for the rally. The idea is that it should cover all our SAARC member countries.
Another important decision from our point of view is that the modalities for the SAARC Disaster Management Centre which is to be located in India, have been approved and the Centre will now hold the first Governing Board meeting and, thereafter, it will be formally established.
Then, if you recall there were three important proposals made by India at the 13th SAARC Summit - (i) setting up of a SAARC Museum for Textiles and Handicrafts, (ii) proposal for establishing a Telemedicine Network linking all the SAARC member countries, (iii) setting up of a South Asia University to which we attach great importance. We are very happy to report that the Council of Ministers which met today endorsed these proposals and welcomed India's initiative in this regard. We have agreed that the details concerning these projects will now be taken up at the next meeting of the Programming Committee. The concept papers have already been circulated to all the member countries. Some comments were made on these proposals by the Ministers today. For example, it was agreed that the idea of a South Asia University is a particularly good one and that we should make it into a Centre of Excellence for our region. It would be an institution which would bring together not only young people from all over the region, but it would also enable some of the brightest minds of South Asia in academics in various fields, whether it is Information Technology or Bio Technology, or some of the science subjects, humanities to come together. This would be a very good venue for the brightest minds of South Asia to interact with one another. So, this was something which was uniformly welcomed by all the Ministers who were present today and we are very much looking forward to taking this idea forward.
I would also like to mention here with regard to South Asia University that you are perhaps aware that Mr. Gohar Rizvi, who is an academic and well known scholar in Bangladesh, has been requested by India to prepare a concept paper for the South Asia University. It is based on his inputs that we have put together the first preliminary paper which has been circulated to all SAARC member countries. In the light of the comments which have been made, our Consultant Mr. Rizvi will take this particular concept paper into some greater detail.
The Council also approved the Report of the First Finance Ministers meeting and again, as I had indicated earlier, the very important decision of the SAARC Finance Ministers was to agree upon the modalities for the SAARC Development Fund. As you know, at the 13TH SAARC summit it was decided that all the different financing mechanisms which are there under SAARC should be integrated together into a common SAARC Development Fund. So this Fund has now been set up and has been approved by the Council of Ministers. As you are aware, India had already announced contribution of US $ 100 million, especially towards projects involving poverty alleviation projects. Now what would happen is that under the social window of the SAARC Development Fund, this money will be available for utilization. We feel that along with SAFTA, which has become operational, the SAARC Development Fund becomes the second pillar of economic cooperation among the SAARC countries. This is something which we welcome very much and we hope that we can move into a phase of more projects being implemented.
One of the things that we are always concerned about is that in the 20 years of existence of SAARC, while we have come up with very interesting ideas and had many sessions with various kinds of initiatives and consultations on different issues, these have not really been translated into even one single collaborative project. This is the great shortcoming of SAARC that we have not moved away so far from a declaratory phase into an implementation phase. It would be correct to say that SAFTA can be described as the first project for collaboration amongst the SAARC countries. The establishment of SDF now creates another platform which will make possible for SAARC countries to really get down into implementing collaborative works. I have mentioned to you the great importance we attach to connectivity amongst the SAARC countries and some of the projects for connectivity include certain corridors, highway corridors or railway corridors or the upgrading of some of our ports or airports. These are some of the projects which would be very conveniently covered under the SAARC Development Fund.
I had also mentioned that during the Council of Ministers Meeting, there was a formal welcome to Afghanistan as our new Member. We are very happy that they were able to attend the Council of Ministers Meeting as a guest. It was decided that an intergovernmental group will be set up to go over and finalize all the various formalities for the formal inclusion of Afghanistan as a Member at the 14th Summit. The Draft Declaration which will have to be signed by Afghanistan committing itself to the SAARC Charter as well as various other Instruments of SAARC, has also been finalized. At the 13th Summit, we had agreed to requests from China and Japan that we would accept them as Observers. Then, later on when we had the meeting of the Standing Committee, we had received requests from the Republic of Korea and from United States of America. The Standing Committee had agreed that we would approve the requests of these two countries to become the Observers to SAARC. Now, just before the meeting of this Council of Ministers, there has been an additional request from the European Union. During the meeting of the Council of Ministers, it was unanimously agreed that this request be approved. It was also agreed that the Observers would be invited to be present at the next Summit, i.e 14th SAARC Summit, which would be held in India.
This is another important decision. I had also mentioned that we would be raising at the Council of Ministers Meeting the issue of SAFTA, the coming into force of SAFTA. We did raise this matter and several delegations who were present in the meeting also drew attention to the fact that nothing should be done which would adversely impact on the operationalisation of SAFTA and that this matter should be resolved as soon as possible. I think it was clear from the statements which were made by other Ministers that they did consider this to be a matter which involved all the SAARC Member States and that this was not something which was merely a bilateral matter or technical issue between India and Pakistan. Now, as a result of our discussions, the Council of Ministers decided to request the SAFTA Ministerial Council to convene and to discuss this and resolve this issue and that the results of their deliberation should be made available to the Council of Ministers at its next meeting. We are very hopeful and optimistic that this matter will be taken up without further delay by the SAFTA Ministerial Council and that when we have the 14th SAARC Summit in Delhi, that this matter has been put behind us. That is our hope.
India is satisfied with the results of the Council of Ministers Meeting. Several of the issues which were of importance to India were discussed in considerable detail and we are also very happy that the report of the Standing Committee, particularly the sections relating, for example, relating to terrorism were specifically drawn attention to by delegations as something which is very important for the future of SAARC. It was agreed that the commitment to eradicating the scourge of terrorism from our region, the need for us all to follow up on our commitments to the various conventions which have been signed on Terrorism as well as on Narcotics Trafficking and that it was critical that all States should implement the provisions of these Instruments and whatever enabling legislation needs to be passed in our respective countries in order to give effect to these conventions. So, this has been a very successful and substantive Council of Ministers Meeting. We have expressed our very deep appreciation to Bangladesh Foreign Minister Morshed Khan for the very efficient and business-like manner in which he conducted the proceedings of the Council of Ministers and enabled us to come to a very successful conclusion. All the delegations were delighted that we have had the opportunity to visit the beautiful city of Dhaka again and to enjoy the warm hospitality of our friendly host.
So I will stop here and if there are any questions I would be of course very happy to answer.
Question (Badiul Hassan, News Today): Regarding SAFTA, an issue has developed since the liberlisation process of India has been nullified by maintenance of tariff and non-tariff barriers. This is not only the complaint of Pakistan, but it is the complaint of Bangladesh also. The Standing Committee and Council of Ministers were to discuss this issue.
Answer: I would first of all like to request you to please focus attention on what has been agreed upon in SAFTA. Nobody has been compelled to agree to anything which is there in SAFTA. This is something which has been agreed upon by all the Member States collectively. If there were issues relating to para-tariffs or if there are issues relating to non-tariff barriers, all these have been taken into account during the negotiations of SAFTA . This is not to say that we cannot improve our trade relations. I think as far as Bangladesh is concerned, perhaps, the chief beneficiary of SAFTA is Bangladesh, because India has free trade agreements with Nepal and Sri Lanka and it has a customs union with Bhutan. So the major beneficiary particularly in the least developed category is Bangladesh. The chief beneficiary in terms of the instrument of revenue loss compensation is Bangladesh and India is the country which in fact champions the cause of Bangladesh during the SAFTA negotiations. It was India which led all Member States to agree to a higher form of compensation.
With regard to many of the concessions which have been given to Bangladesh, these are all non-reciprocal in nature. Again, I would like to make the point that this is not to say that we cannot improve the trade relations, particularly the negotiations that we are already having with Bangladesh. With regard to non-tariff barriers, many of these elements will be taken into account. There is an Early Harvest already in place with the export of cement and ceramics from Bangladesh. So I don't think it is fair to really point fingers at India and say that India has not been doing enough with respect to these kind of barriers. All of us maintain certain barriers. This is the reason why there are sensitive lists in SAFTA. The sensitive lists have been negotiated amongst the Member Countries. Our sensitive list is the shortest and it should be because we are the largest country in the region. But I think once we have decided that we will operate this Free Trade Agreement in the region on the basis of sensitive list and not on the basis of so called 'positive list', then it stands to reason that if one country is imposing the same mechanism of positive list, this is a negation of SAFTA. So I don't think there is any reason to put the complaint that India has made on the same level as complaints from Pakistan or from Bangladesh with regard to so called non-tariff barriers or para tariff barriers.
Question: My question is about SDF - how this financing process would be implemented and whether only the contribution of India of $ 100 million will be considered or other partners would also contribute?
Answer: Well, I was referring to the US$ 100 million contribution made by India but when it was decided to set up the SDF, I think the fund will start of with a contribution from all Member Countries totaling up to US$ 300 million. Further contributions will be on the basis of the assessed contribution of Member Countries. But the additional element is that the Board which will be governing the SDF would also have the possibility of raising funds from the international market or from the international financial agencies for any specific infrastructure projects that they may decide upon. Since this would be in fact something which would be done on the basis of all the Member Countries of SAARC, it would enable us to leverage our strength in terms of raising more finance for these types of projects. So, actually this can be a very useful mechanism for financing some very important infrastructure projects.
Question (Farooq, Pakistan Times): Sir, you have issued a press noting in press conference which is Pakistan specific and saying that Pakistan is denying implementation of SAFTA. Then Pakistan took a stand to take the issue to expert's level and finally issued a statement. Whose stand do you think has been vindicated?
Answer: I would hesitate to term it as a win or loss kind of situation. As I said, it is not India or Pakistan. What we are concerned about is that a certain step taken by Pakistan may jeopardize the future of SAFTA itself. And therefore it is not a matter of whether has India won out or if Pakistan has won out. The issue is whether or not the SAARC Ministerial Council has considered this matter and seen it fit to accept that this is something which will impact on the agreement itself and therefore must be dealt with expeditiously. The fact that the Ministerial Council did spend time discussing this matter and where there were interventions made not only by India and Pakistan, but by other delegations also who were present. The sense of the Council of Ministers was that irrespective of whatever points may have been raised, there is no doubt that if this matter is not resolved satisfactorily, it is something which will impact on SAFTA as an agreement among the SAARC countries.
So it is a matter that whether we like it or not, it does impact on the future of SAFTA and it does impact on the future of the SAARC process. So from that point of view, all the delegations, including the delegation of Pakistan, have welcomed that this matter will be now considered by the SAFTA Ministerial Council and also that the results of the meeting of the Ministerial Council on this particular issue will be available to the Council of Ministers at its next meeting. So, it is a recognition of the fact that this is an important policy issue and that it cannot be delegated to a simple technical procedure under SAFTA. So, we think that our view that this is an important policy issue that it impacts on all SAARC Member Countries has been accepted. We believe that this has been considered and recognized by the Council of Ministers Meeting.
Quwstion: When will be meeting of experts take place?
Answer: Well, now that a decision has been taken by Council of Ministers that this matter should be taken up by SAFTA Ministerial Council, what we intend to do is now on the basis of this decision we will be suggesting some dates to the Member Countries for an early meeting of the SAFTA Ministerial Council.
Question: Will SAARC again turn into a battlefield between India and Pakistan due to SAFTA?
Answer: Well, I don't think that from the point of view of India, there was any reason to convert the SAARC meetings or SAARC into a feat for India-Pakistan competition because we don't think that this is India- Pakistan competition. I think both India and Pakistan recognize that we have a shared destiny, that the future of SAARC as a forum for regional economic cooperation can only go ahead if there is cooperation amongst all the countries of the region, not merely between India and Pakistan. So, right from the beginning, our effort was to precisely project that this is not a matter between India and Pakistan, but this is a matter which concerns all the SAARC Member Countries and that is the spirit in which this matter was discussed during the Council of Ministers meeting.
Question(Amitabh Reki, NDTV): Sir, moving to bilateral relations between India and Pakistan, the talks between Foreign Secretaries were postponed. Pakistan has said that the ball is in India's court and that it is up to India to propose the dates for next meeting?
Answer: Well, we can go into a long argument about the ball being in who's court! We can keep throwing the ball back and forth between the two sides! What is important is that we had an opportunity for the two Foreign Secretaries to discuss the issue with certain degree of candour and frankness the concerns that we have and I have mentioned to you what our concerns are. We have also stated quite openly that we expect that on the issue of terrorism, we should be able to see some evidence of Pakistan fulfilling the very solemn commitments that have been made at the highest level. Concerning terrorists, we have agreed that we will remain in touch and there is also a common understanding that the peace process between the two countries is very important and that we should try and take this process forward. This is what the leadership of the two countries wish, this is what the people of Pakistan and people of India wish. So, it will be our endeavour to make certain through whatever appropriate actions which are required that this peace process does not get affected and it is in this context that the two Foreign Secretaries have agreed to remain in touch.
Question (Amitabh Reki, NDTV): We say we want evidence of Pakistan acting against terrorism, while they say they want evidence of linkages with terrorism. What is your reaction to it?
Answer: Well, I don't think I would describe the situation as stalemate as there is ongoing dialogue between our two countries. With regard to evidence, well, our view has again been expressed rather clearly that we have provided considerable amount of evidence in the past, most recently during the Home Secretary level talks. I have pointed out myself to the fact that we have, for example, the leader of the Jamaat-u-Dawa which is a reincarnation of the Lashker-e-Toiba, as everybody knows. We have seen him going around freely and JuD continues to profess that it will carry on Jehad with regard to India. We also have the Hizbul Mujahideen chief who moves around quite freely within Pakistan. Certainly, no efforts seem to have been made to apprehend him. So there are certain actions which could be taken very easily in order to convince the people of India that when Pakistan says that it is very serious about curbing terrorism, that it is going to take some action in order to do that. That is our position.
Question: Why is India hindering the access of Bangladesh products to Nepal via Banglabandha Landport?
Answer: Well, I am not quite certain why you say that there is a hindrance, there is a very open corridor and the question is whether or not there is enough traffic. If you are going to have, may be 4 or 5 trucks which are going to cross over everyday, then it is unreasonable to expect that India should have a full scale 24 hour customs post or immigration post at that point for those 4-5 trucks. So what usually happens is that there is usually a build-up of may be 20 trucks or 25 trucks at the border when the immigration and customs officials are called in, in order to clear the traffic. Once the volume of traffic increases, the infrastructure can certainly be improved, through mutual agreement
