default
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00the European Union. I am not so foolish as to jump to a Bay of Bengal Union, but we can
00:08at least have a Bay of Bengal Economic Cooperation. Thank you so much.
00:15You said the long-term is segment of a Saudi-Asian regional co-operation, SAARC co-operation.
00:21What do you think about it?
00:24Listen, SAARC initiative was taken by Bangladesh under the leadership of late President Zia-ul-Ahmad.
00:33We had to do very intensive diplomacy first with India and Pakistan to get them on board
00:40because they were at that time and perhaps still are the two major powers in the divided India which emerged after 1947.
00:51SAARC inherent failure I think was the fact that it wanted improvement in trade and economic relations and cultural relations,
01:03but deliberately refrained from addressing contentious political issues.
01:10It did not encourage people-to-people contact because visa regimes particularly among India, Pakistan and Bangladesh were very restrictive.
01:20How do you expect trade to expand if tradesmen in each of these countries cannot go to each other's countries freely?
01:32To talk about business. You can't do trade. There was no online trading in those days either.
01:39So it was in a sense condemning itself to failure by not addressing it.
01:46Ten years after SAARC when I was addressing issues related to SAARC and preparing for the SAARC summit in 1996,
01:56I frankly voiced my skepticism that SAARC was going anywhere because it had not in my perception gone anywhere after ten years from between 85 to 95.
02:08Regional, intra-regional trade was still hovering between 2.5 to 4% at that time.
02:19Even then we were saying it has increased 100%, but it had not gone above 5% of the inter-regional figures that we have comparatively for ASEAN or European Union or other regional organizations.
02:34Which there the figures are between 30% to 45%, 50%. So obviously there is something wrong.
02:44The problem is the relationship, the very strained and even hostile relationship between India and Pakistan kept progress in the whole of SAARC hostage.
02:58And that is why Bangladesh at that time decided to try and encourage sub-regional cooperation so that one part of SAARC could at least do some work without being hostage to India-Pakistan hostilities.
03:14India-Pakistan relations today are as bad if not worse than they were in 1985 when the organization was set up.
03:25So I don't see how we can make SAARC work if we do not address the fundamental malaise and weaknesses within the organization.
03:35And I don't see that happening unless India and Pakistan sit down and normalize the relationship.
03:43So should we continue being hostage to that dynamics or should we think of other parts where we can get on with our lives and wait and hope and pray that they will also come to an understanding.
03:57Then Afghanistan which feels totally left out of SAARC now because it cannot come through Pakistan, through India, to the rest of South Asia, is perhaps the biggest loser in this.
04:10But all of us are losers in one way or another.
04:13What is the biggest challenge? Do you think India-Pakistan rivalry is the biggest challenge to re-emerge SAARC also?
04:21I think the basic question is if you look at problems between India-Pakistan or India-China or other border problems anywhere,
04:33wherever there is a border problem between two neighboring countries, relations become hostage, relations in other fields, economic fields, cultural fields, other fields,
04:43unless leaders consciously decide that they will put borders aside and do other relationships.
04:50And I think India, you know, after 1947, India had three large borders.
04:57The largest border was with Bangladesh.