The Hindu : Delhi, Dhaka want trade hurdles removed

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Jun 18, 2002

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National

Delhi, Dhaka want trade hurdles removed

By C. Raja Mohan

NEW DELHI June 17. India and Bangladesh today stressed the importance of removing at the earliest the many obstacles on the way towards an economic integration between the two nations.

There was a ``clearly expressed political will'' on both sides to move quickly towards expanded trade and transit ties, the Foreign Office spokeswoman said in a comment on the talks between the visiting Bangladesh Foreign Minister, Morshed Khan, and the External Affairs Minister, Jaswant Singh.

India and Bangladesh have long squabbled over Dhaka's demand for ``duty-free'' access to its products in the Indian market and New Delhi's quest for transit rights through Bangladesh territory to the Indian North-East.

Although today's talks did not go into the details of trade and transit and the linkage between the two sets of issues, India and Bangladesh were signalling today positive political intent to move forward.

The two Ministers acknowledged the new imperatives of Indo-Bangla economic cooperation in a globalising world and agreed that the two nations could not be ``defeated by small difficulties'', the spokeswoman said.

This is the first visit to India by the Foreign Minister since the elections last October that brought the Bangladesh National Party to power in Dhaka.

Mr. Khan is a businessman himself and was apparently reflecting the new Dhaka desire of wanting to get on with the task of deepening commercial links with New Delhi.

He used the opportunity to dispel the misperceptions in New Delhi that Dhaka wants to mediate between India and Pakistan in their current confrontation.

There was political irritation in New Delhi at reports from Dhaka that Bangladesh wants to interject itself into Indo-Pakistan disputes.

While Bangladesh was concerned about new military tensions in the subcontinent, it had no desire to get in the middle of Indo-Pakistan disputes, it was conveyed to the Indian side today.

The Bangladesh delegation also apparently made it quite clear that organisations such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation had no role in the bilateral issues between New Delhi and Islamabad.

While reaffirming India's commitment to peace in the region, Mr. Singh insisted that ``there is no scope for multiplicity of efforts'' on easing the current stand-off between New Delhi and Islamabad.

Earlier in the day, Mr. Khan had a lengthy discussion with the National Security Adviser, Brajesh Mishra.

Mr. Khan also had consultations with the former Prime Minister, Inder Kumar Gujral, and the Leader of the Opposition, Sonia Gandhi.

He called on the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, in the evening. Mr. Khan will depart for Bangladesh on Tuesday morning.

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