bdnews24.com :
Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s last meeting with a foreign head of government may be with Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina.
The foreign offices of the two countries are trying to set up a meeting between the two Prime Ministers at Nay Phi Daw, Myanmar’s capital, on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC summit beginning on March 4.
The third BIMSTEC summit will be attended by heads of states or governments of the member countries – India, Bangladesh, Thailand, Sri Lanka, Nepal and Myanmar.
Officials of the Indian ministry of external affairs
say the final schedule of the Hasina-Manmohan meeting on the sidelines of the BIMSTEC conference is being worked out.
“This is on and in all probability will happen if the two Prime Ministers make it to Nay Phi Daw,” a senior MEA official said.
Singh and Hasina have met on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly meeting last year.
Manmohan Singh made a special effort to upgrade India’s relations with Bangladesh but has been somewhat undone by opposition parties and allies who blocked the proposed Teesta water sharing treaty he was all set to sign during his last visit to Dhaka .
They have also blocked in parliament the Land Boundary agreement his government signed during that visit.
Singh’s government finally managed to introduce the land boundary agreement in the parliament but it is yet to be passed.
West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee has opposed both the Teesta and the land boundary agreements tooth and nail.
Bangladesh, Bhutan, Myanmar, India, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand are the member countries of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC).
It was formed in Bangkok in 1997. But it took seven years to hold its first summit in 2004 in Bangkok.
The second BIMSTEC summit was held in New Delhi in 2008. It has taken another six years to get the third summit going. Myanmar now holds the chair of BIMSTEC.
