The cabinet on Monday gave its assent to set up seven new consulates abroad as part of country’s efforts to enhance trade, diplomatic and cultural ties with countries at different parts of world. “The cabinet approved the foreign ministry proposal in this regard at its weekly meeting with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina in the chair,” Cabinet Secretary M Shafiul Alam told a news briefing emerging from the meeting at Bangladesh Secretariat.
He said the proposed consulates would be set up at Aghan capital of Kabul, Sudanese capital of Khartoum, Free Town of South Africa, Rumanian capital Bucharest, India’s Chennai, Australian city of Sydney and Toronto of Canada.
Cabinet members, state ministers and concerned secretaries attended the meeting which also gave approval with retrospective effect to a decision of setting up 17 diplomatic missions abroad. These missions were set up at Greek capital of Athens, Milan of Italy, India’s Mumbai, Turkish capital of Istanbul, Lisbon of Portugal, China’s Kunming, Lebanese capital Beirut, Mexico City, Brazilian capital of Brasilia, Port Louis of France, Danish capital of Copenhagen, Polish capital of Warsaw, Austrian capital of Vienna, Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa, Nigeria’s Abuja, Algerian capital of Algiers and Guwahati of India.
“These missions were set up in 2014, but approval of the cabinet was not taken mistakenly. So the cabinet has given approval to the MoFA (foreign ministry) proposal with retrospective effect,” the cabinet secretary said.
The cabinet on Monday, he said, also gave final approval to the draft of Nazrul Institute Act, 2017, and a proposal to make Bangladesh a party of the Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-Border Paperless Trade in Asia and Pacific. Alam said the Nazrul Institute Act, 2017, will replace the Nazrul Institute Ordinance, 1984 without any major change except increasing the number of the managing board members to nine from seven.
UNESCAP in it 72nd session made the decision on the paperless trade among member Asia and Pacific countries as part of the one stop service, single window project, easy of doing business to promote online trade system among the member countries.
The cabinet secretary said at the meeting onset the cabinet adopted a resolution congratulating Saima Wazed Hossain, a globally renowned champion for the cause of autism spectrum disorder, for getting the International Champion Award last month.
Saima Wazed, President of the National Advisory Council on Neurological Developmental Disorder and Autism and member of WHO’s mental health expert team, received the award from Shema Kolainu, a New York based School and Center for Children with Autism for her relentless and innovative works for the wellbeing of the persons with autism.
