SOUTH ASIA: Leaders Meet In Colombo Against N-Tests Backdrop

By Feizal Samath Reprint | | Print |

Feizal Samath

COLOMBO, Jul 27 1998 (IPS) - Leaders of South Asia’s seven countries will be meeting this week in Sri Lanka’s capital to discuss the region’s economic and political future, but nuclear rivalry between India and Pakistan is not on the agenda.

Instead a bilateral meeting of their premiers on the sidelines of the 10th SAARC or South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation summit has become the most eagerly awaited event of the annual meeting.

More than 150 journalists from member countries and foreign media are flying down to Colombo to cover the first high-level contact since the neighbours conducted nuclear tests last May.

Still no one is expecting the closed-door talks between Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee and his Pakistani counterpart, premier Nawaz Sharif, to lead to “earth shattering announcements”.

“They would most probably issue a guarded statement expressing their interest in restoring foreign secretary level contacts and other matters to smoothen strained relations,” said a diplomatic source who did not want to be identified.

SAARC’s inability to tackle issues of regional concern like security because its charter bars any discussion or negotiation on contentious issues, has often led to criticism that the 13- year-old grouping is only a talking shop.

“It is a pity that the matter of South Asian security would not be discussed by all seven together, for this is the principal issue that concerns the well being of us all on the Indian subcontinent today,” writes Nanda Godage, a retired Sri Lankan career diplomat and foreign affairs commentator.

Many regional analysts also blame the rivalries between member countries for the region’s continued failure to progress on issues of regional development and poverty alleviation

Thirteen years ago, SAARC was set up to improve the lives of the 1.2 billion people who live in the region, most of whom are poor, and make them self-reliant and economically independent.

Little has changed since in Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The region is still home to the world’s greatest numbers of poor people with human development indexes lower than in sub-Saharan Africa.

Sri Lanka’s Ponna Wignaraja, vice-chairman of the independent South Asian Commission on Poverty Alleviation is very disillusioned. “What does SAARC mean to the people on the street — common people; the poor?” he asks rhetorically.

The commission was appointed in 1991, when then Sri Lankan president Ranasinghe Premadasa was chairman of SAARC, to look at poverty structures in the region and develop a cohesive, overall strategy of poverty alleviation in South Asia. The plan was to eradicate poverty in the region by 2002.

Although the commission came up with a well-structured action plan for implementation in the region, little has been done in the past seven years to reduce poverty in South Asia.

Poverty will be far down on the list of priorities of South Asian leaders during the July 29-31 Colombo meeting. Instead improving business and trade ties has topped the agenda.

Global economic issues and how SAARC member countries can benefit from the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and other trading blocks will be the main theme of discussion at the South Asian summit.

The summit will review the progress in setting up the South Asian Free Trade Association (SAFTA). Though it was originally meant to open in 2005, member countries decided to advance the date to 2001. But a new report by a committee has said that date might be ambitious and suggested 2010 as more practical.

Sri Lankan Foreign Minister who briefed the press on the agenda of the summit last Friday said, “the goal of 2001 remains high on the agenda. We hope this summit will give further direction in this area. But whether the target of SAFTA can be extended, I cannot say.”

Many analysts say the creation of a regional economic grouping could be still born unless South Asian governments can ensure political stability in their countries and resolve differences between themselves.

The lifting of tariff barriers in the region — a SAARC initiative — has been hampered by India and Pakistan’s uneasy relationship. Islamabad has refused to give India most favoured nation status, because it fears New Delhi’s economic clout.

Godage, former Sri Lankan diplomat, said disputes between India and Pakistan, which led to both countries flexing their nuclear muscle recently, has destabilised the security of the whole region.

As the host nation, Sri Lanka’s President President Chandrika Kumaratunga should arrange a separate, informal meeting with visiting leaders and discuss political stability of the region at the summit this week, he suggested.

Security concerns, though not on the official agenda of the summit, are likely to be raised again and again.