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Bangla PM lauds Gujral's role in promoting peace

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina tonight lauded the role played by I K Gujral in the reduction of tension in South Asia even as the Indian prime minister called for developing ''new frontiers'' of cooperation in the region.

"The efforts that you have made for reduction of tension in South Asia deserve our warmest congratulation,'' Sheikh Hasina told Gujral at a banquet she hosted in his honour.

She said Gujral's bold initiatives had brought about a ''qualitative change'' in the politics of South Asia. ''It has given our politics a moral fabric that will contribute to sustained peace and stability for our economic development.''

Gujral, who arrived in Dhaka on Wednesday evening for the 'Trilateral Business Summit' between India, Pakistan and Bangladesh tomorrow, regretted that the South Asian region had lost precious time in building relations.

"Let us make this summit a memorable one so that all those involved in it can look back on this encounter at some future date and say that this was where we left behind our debilitating suspicions and moved towards our shared destiny,'' he added.

Gujral said the business summit would enable the leaders of business and industry of Bangladesh, India, and Pakistan to develop a common platform for building bridges of cooperation between the people of South Asia.

Both the prime ministers referred to the signing of the historic Ganga water sharing treaty between the two countries, saying it had paved way for a great headway in bilateral relations.

Gujral said the scope for bilateral cooperation was immense and encompassed the entire range of human economic activity, from transport and communications, power, energy, trade and investment and human resources development.

Regional and subregional cooperation will upgrade our infrastructure and generate employment and prosperity, he said.

Sheikh Hasina said Gujral's initiative to lower tariff restrictions on a wide range of goods imported by Bangladesh from India had helped in bilateral trade. Some more efforts are needed in this area to properly balance our trade.

She said the two countries had in recent times succeeded in resolving the problems of insurgency in the Chittagong hill tracts. "Through negotiations, we have convinced the insurgents to lay down their arms and come back to the mainstream of national life," the Bangladeshi prime minster said.

Sheikh Hasina said Gujral's presence for the business summit could be considered a milestone in the development of bilateral relations.

Gujral is expected to take up the issue of extradition of United Liberation Front of Asom General Secretary Anup Chetia, who was arrested in Dhaka earlier this month.

Chetia -- a top ranking militant leader of the banned outfit ULFA -- was arrested by Interpol from a posh residential area. Interpol had issued a red corner warrant against Chetia and four other ULFA leaders in August last year.

According to official sources, Gujral will urge Sheikh Hasina to expedite the process of Chetia's extradition so that he could be tried in Indian courts in various cases against him. The sources said though India and Bangladesh do not have an extradition treaty between them, Chetia could be sent to India under the SAARC convention on terrorism.

A major area of concern for the two countries is the tardy progress of cooperation in the trade and economic fields.

It is being felt in both the countries that intra-SAARC trade must increase substantially so that the SAARC countries could become attractive markets for foreign investors. Gujral and Sheikh Hasina will obviously discuss steps to boost trade.

The first-ever 'Trilateral Business Summit' is expected to explore how best to open up vast opportunities for business and industry in the third countries.

Sitting together with the captains of industry from their nations, prime ministers Gujral, Sheikh Hasina, and Nawaz Sharif of Pakistan will seek to dismantle trade barriers within the subcontinent and find ways and means to accelerate trade.

This is the first time that the leaders of the three countries, putting aside their many bilateral political differences, are coming on a common platform for the well-being of their peoples.

The Dhaka economic summit is taking place at the initiative of the Bangladesh premier, who issued invitations for the meeting at the Male SAARC summit in May last year.

Originally, the summit was to be held in November last year but had to be postponed due to the political crisis in Pakistan.

Official sources said the summit will send a clear message to the global community that the three largest countries of the subcontinent mean business and are ready to set aside their political differences for the overall prosperity of the region.

"The fact that the summit is being organised at a time when India and Pakistan are celebrating the 50th anniversaries of their Independence and the venue is Dhaka, over which New Delhi and Islamabad have had their differences, goes to show that the three countries are ready to do serious business with each other,'' the sources added.

The agenda of the summit will include reduction of barriers in trade and investment, improvement of regional infrastructure and the promotion of joint ventures in key areas, like energy.

It is expected the business summit will help in the implementation of the SAARC leaders' decision to achieve a South Asian Free Trade Area by the year 2001.

The sources said that by deepening economic cooperation among themselves, each of the three nations hopes to become a more attractive destination for foreign capital, which could take advantage of an integrated market in the subcontinent.

UNI