Inaugurating an interaction on ´Building bridges and promoting people to people interaction in South Asia’ Sunday, she expressed the confidence that the 17th Summit Conference of SAARC that is going to be held in the Maldives may give direction for the establishment of the association.[break]
She said the Inter-governmental expert groups on financial issues were formed to fulfill the dream of establishing the association and preparing the guidelines for settling the financial issues. She stressed for presenting a common concept of SAARC members to recognize the customs procedures, harmonizing standards, avoiding double taxation, promoting and protecting investments and adopting measures to facilitate trade.
Issues like tariff and non-tariff barriers continue to impede intra-regional trade under South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA), Saeed said, adding the summit conference could be able to push aside such barriers.
It is necessary to have the movement of people and goods without any disruption through land, water, and air route for the establishment and expansion of the association which will broaden the area of regional cooperation, said General Secretary Saeed.
Former general secretary of SAARC Neehal Rodrigo said the SAARC should center its activities to work for conflict management and establishment of peace, and for clearing the impeding factors of financial promotion.
At the programme, Director of the interaction organizing committee Nishchal Nath Pandey said the interaction was organised to find out the public´s expectation and notion to be presented in the 17th conference.
Around 40 representatives from the Philippines, Singapore, Germany, and Belgium have been participating in the interaction.
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