South Asia would benefit from revival of neglected bloc – Bangladeshi official

SAARC would help improve supply chains and reduce logistics costs in South Asia, BNP leader Nasir Uddin Ahmed Ashim told RT India

The revival of a neglected regional bloc would benefit all of South Asia, a top aide of the Bangladesh National Party (BNP) has told RT India.

The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) has been effectively dormant since the 2016 Islamabad summit, which was canceled, due to problems between the bloc’s two largest countries – India and Pakistan.

Founded in 1985, the grouping’s other full members include Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Nepal, Bhutan, and Afghanistan.

“SAARC has remained largely ineffective due to India-Pakistan political tensions by limiting regional trade, connectivity, and collective diplomacy,” BNP International Affairs Secretary Nasir Uddin Ahmed Ashim said on Monday. “The revival of SAARC, as [Prime Minister-elect] Tarique Rahman realized, would benefit the whole region, mostly South Asia.”

The BNP won a two-thirds majority in the general election on February 12. Rahman will be sworn in as prime minister on Tuesday in Dhaka.

“The revival [of SAARC] remains strategically important for Bangladesh because South Asia remains the least economically integrated region globally,” Ashim said in an interview with RT. “Dhaka would benefit from regional supply chains, energy trade, transit connectivity, and reduced logistics costs.”

In 2020, New Delhi reportedly tried to revive the South Asian bloc to counter the Covid-19 pandemic and China’s growing influence.

The last SAARC summit was held in Kathmandu in 2014. New Delhi boycotted the 2016 summit due to tensions with Islamabad after a terrorist attack in Jammu and Kashmir.