The Hindu : PM may go to Pak. for SAARC meet

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Jul 11, 2003

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PM may go to Pak. for SAARC meet

Kathmandu July 10. The deferred South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) summit will now be held in Islamabad from January 4 next year. The meet may bring the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, face to face with the Pakistani leadership, two years after the Pakistan President, Pervez Musharraf's dramatic handshake with him here during the last summit.

All the seven member-countries endorsed by consensus the Pakistan Government's proposal to host the SAARC summit from January 4 to 6 next year, the Foreign Secretary, Kanwal Sibal, told reporters after the SAARC Standing Committee meeting, where the decision was taken.

Indicating that Mr. Vajpayee might travel to Pakistan to attend the meeting, he said: "This consensus would not have been reached if India was not going to participate in the summit."

Pakistan wanted to host the summit last January but postponed it saying that India had not confirmed its participation. New Delhi had held that no decision was taken on dates for the summit.

According to the SAARC charter, participation of all heads of state and government of the member-nations is a must for a summit to be convened.

Even as Mr. Sibal announced the agreement between the SAARC members to hold the 12th summit of the regional grouping in Islamabad, he blamed Pakistan as being the "slowest in moving forward in the area of economic cooperation". He said he was confident that Pakistan would speed up.

Asked whether Indo-Pak ties hampered the SAARC process from moving ahead, Mr. Sibal's answer was an emphatic "no". "I don't agree on that. It is Pakistan's lack of commitment on the SAARC economic agenda that has blocked the SAARC process."

India has never caused any obstacle to the SAARC business, Mr. Sibal said, adding "we are having cooperation with Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Bhutan. India's commitment to economic cooperation is substantial."

The two-day Foreign Secretary-level meeting was smooth and all important issues were discussed. Remarkable progress has been made on the economic cooperation front," he said.

He hoped that the South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) treaty would be finalised before the next SAARC summit.

The Secretary-level meeting discussed matters relating to the SAFTA treaty framework, reducing tariffs and trade facilitation procedures.

The SAFTA treaty framework will be finalised during the SAARC Committee of Experts meeting scheduled to be held in Kathmandu from September 17 to 19, according to officials. The fifth round of SAFTA negotiations will be take place after that. India will host three ministerial meetings towards the third quarter of 2003, Mr. Sibal said. They are ministerial meetings on Science and Technology, Health and Information and Broadcasting.

On Indo-Pak tensions, Mr. Sibal said India had taken some positive steps, including resumption of bus service between Lahore and New Delhi. He, however, asked Pakistan to show visible credible evidence of ending cross-border terrorism before bilateral talks could start. — PTI

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