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Gujral's plea to SAARC leaders
By Atul Aneja
NEW DELHI, JAN. 2. The former Prime Minister, Mr. I.K. Gujral, has urged leaders of SAARC countries to deepen their collective resolve against terrorism and revive the dormant economic agenda of the grouping.
In a letter, addressed individually to the seven South Asian heads, Mr. Gujral advocated more teeth for the existing SAARC convention on terrorism.
Making specific recommendations, he said that an updated SAARC convention should make it mandatory for all members to ``totally prohibit'' asylum and financial resources to terrorist organisations. The new legal arrangement should have enforcement provisions such as extradition of extremists.
Mr. Gujral, who advocated urgent and ``concrete action'', said that the U.N. Security Council resolution 1373 passed after the September 11 terrorist strikes in the U.S. was a useful guide for fortifying the SAARC convention.
Apprehending possible bureaucratic delays, he felt that the existing convention need not be forwarded to an ``experts committee'' for a revamp. Instead, the SAARC leaders could take advantage of the ``evolution of regional consensus'' for change that had already emerged among the SAARC officials to update this regime. ``We can no longer leave our collective fight against terrorism, hampered by our existing or stipulated individual national legislations as is the case at present''.
Lack of sustained ``political will'' had allowed the forces of terrorism to grip all the SAARC countries, Mr. Gujral observed. As a result, none of the seven countries could any longer ``afford to hesitate, since each one of our countries are threatened directly by the forces of terror and extremism''.
Defeating the ``dastardly forces'' of violence and destruction was necessary for building a better future for the people of South Asia.
Stressing the need for promoting SAARC's ``economic and developmental goals'', Mr. Gujral drew the attention to the relevance of expanded regional trade. To facilitate commerce, the preferential trade and free trade processes under the SAPTA and the SAFTA should be addressed as quickly as possible, he said.
Mr. Gujral pointed out that the ``Eminent Persons Group'' that had been set up in 1997 in Male had made appropriate recommendations to review ``the derailed SAPTA and SAFTA processes.'' Their findings deserved ``active consideration for implementation''.
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