Former foreign secretary Syed Muazzem Ali has died today at the age of 75 during his treatment at the Combined Military Hospital in Dhaka.
Prior to his passing, he served the Bangladesh government as its high commissioner to India. Ali had joined the Pakistan Foreign Service in 1968 and retired from the diplomatic service in December 2001. He later took up the New Delhi assignment under a new contract and returned to Dhaka in November after his term expired.
Ali left behind a long legacy of working for Bangladesh as its representative on the global stage. While working in the Pakistan Embassy in Washington in 1971, he declared his allegiance to the government of Bangladesh.
As a founding member of the Bangladesh Mission in Washington, he was active in the lobbying process for political support for Bangladesh’s independence movement.
After independence, he was directly involved in working toward the US recognition of Bangladesh and the World Bank and UN participation in the massive reconstruction efforts in war-ravaged country from 1971 to 1975.
As foreign secretary, Ali worked for the peaceful resolution of conflicts in South Asia and beyond. Since Bangladesh was the chairman of the LDC group at that time, he coordinated the move that led to duty-free and quota-free access of LDC exports to the EU at the third UN LDC conference.
He also worked for the emergence of Bangladesh as the largest troop contributor to UN peacekeeping efforts. –bdnews24.com
