Author:
Publication: BJP Today
Date: February 1-15, 2002
The following is the text of the
Prime Minister, Shri Atal Behari Vajpayee's speech at the SAARC Summit
in Kathmandu today:
"I join my colleagues in thanking
the government and the people of Nepal for the warmth of their welcome
and hospitality. We appreciate the excellent arrangements for this Summit.
It is an uplifting experience for
me to he here in this charming city of Kathmandu, the earthly abode of
the Lord Pashupatinath, and in a country with which India is linked by
geography, kinship, tradition and culture.
Your country has recently been through
gruesome tragedy and domestic turmoil, but you have emerged from them with
a more resilient society and stronger roots of your democracy.
I felicitate you on your assumption
of the Chair of SAARC and wish you a rewarding tenure in its stewardship.
We extend our fullest cooperation to you in guiding the Association forward.
As Sri Lanka passes the baton, we salute the tireless efforts of its President,
who led the organization through a difficult and turbulent period of its
history with a combination of firmness and tact.
Our official and ministerial delegations
have been meeting over the last few days, working on our collective decisions
which will give SAARC its orientation in the 21st century.
Mr. Chairman,
SAARC turned 16 last month. In its
formative years, it has developed the base for a strong network of economic,
social, cultural scientific and technical collaboration in the region.
Our Integrated Programme of Action defines a broad-based agenda. The Group
of Eminent Persons has identified the elements of a social agenda which
could form the nucleus of a SAARC Social Charter. Sri Lanka's initiative
for a SAARC Cultural Centre underlines the common cultural heritage of
our unique South Asian identity. More and more of our professionals like
doctors and accountants, writers and painters, business leaders and journalists
are establishing associations with their counterparts across borders.
What we need today is the dose of
maturity which would lead SAARC from adolescence to adulthood. It would
enable us to put aside our mutual rivalries, so that our scarce resources
can be concentrated on the pressing agenda of eradication of poverty, hunger,
disease, and illiteracy. It would not let political obsessions cloud our
collective vision of a vibrant and prosperous South Asian community.
Some months ago, I wrote to a South
Asian colleague, reminding him that the common enemy of our two countries
is poverty and inviting him to take with us the high road of cooperation
and reconciliation to satisfy the shared aspirations of our people. From
this forum today, I make the same appeal to all the leaders of South Asia:
let us jointly declare war on the poverty which afflicts about half a billion
people in our region alone. Let us develop regional poverty alleviation
programmes, which would complement our national schemes and strengthen
our commitment to implement them.
Ten years ago, we set up an Independent
South Asian Commission on Poverty Alleviation with a membership of eminent
South Asians. The Dhaka Summit endorsed its report and committed South
Asia to work for total eradication of poverty, preferably by 2002. Unfortunately
this joint endeavour never took off.
I believe that we owe it to our
people to make another sincere attempt. The Poverty Commission still exists;
let it be revived and reconvened to update and flesh out its 1992 report.
Let us this time show great commitment to making our cooperative mechanisms
work.
India is willing to host the meetings
of the reconvened Poverty Commission and extend all assistance to enable
it to complete its work expeditiously.
Mr. Chairman,
Four countries in our region are
in the least developed category, the other three are developing countries.
As the technological revolution advances and globalisation shrinks the
world, the challenges which confront us require innovative responses. We
do not want our socioeconomic disparities of today to he transformed into
digital divide of tomorrow. We have to take difficult decisions to reconcile
the pace of our liberalisation with the needs of our nascent industries
and equitable development. It is important that we recognise the primacy
of the economic agenda in SAARC. Our region is home to one fifth of the
humanity. With a market of this size, our natural wealth, our human resources,
our technical skills and our intellectual strengths, an integrated South
Asia can be an economic power house by using its synergies creatively in
building up on the mutual complementaries of its constituent economies.
We have to increase our intra-regional
trade which is limited by a variety of national barriers. In an intensely
competitive world regional economic groupings create obvious economics
of scale. At times of wider recession regional trade can cushion their
adverse impact. The progression from SAPTA to a free trade area and then
to South Asian Economic Union has a self evident economic logic. Government
industry partnership also promote regional trade and I congratulate the
SAARC Chamber of Commerce on this initiative. We have extraordinary cases
of trade between two adjoining countries of our region being channeled
through a distant third country. Developing countries with severe balance
of payments problem cannot afford the luxury of this extra burden on their
national exchequer or the consumers pockets. While promoting intra-regional
trade we also need to address the special needs and circumstances of least
developed countries. India can consider further concessional duty regimes
for products from these countries. We have already accorded this benefit
to Nepal and Bhutan. I recommend consultations among our Ministers to identify
specific proposals to invigorate the South Asian growth quadrangle. I am
also proposing that the Commerce Secretaries meet at the very earliest
to address such trade facilitation issues.
Mr. Chairman,
India has been a victim of international
terrorism for two decades now. Other countries in our region have also
been similarly affected. Terrorism uses different religions, territorial,
economic and ethnic justifications in different countries. But the end
product of mindless violence, civilian casualties, economic disruption
and social tensions is the same everywhere.
We now have an international coalition
against terrorism which accepts that terrorism has to be countered in a
global and comprehensive manner. The international community has agreed
that no country would allow its soil to be used actively or passively to
finance shelter, arm or train terrorist groups. The recent experience of
Afghanistan also showed graphically that tolerance acquiescence or sponsorship
of terrorism creates a monster out of the control of its own creator.
It was in this city of Kathmandu
14 years ago that the SAARC countries adopted a convention on the suppression
of terrorism. As an international measure, that document was somewhat ahead
of its times. Unfortunately, consequent action was not taken by some countries.
We in South Asia have to recognise that our cooperative future will be
significantly influenced by the way in which we can tackle terrorism together.
Updating and strengthening the SAARC convention would provide a contemporary
framework for cooperation in this area. It would also be a powerful confidence
building measure which would create positive ripples in virtually every
area of our interaction within SAARC.
Mr. Chairman,
The SAARC summit has convened today
after nearly three and a half years. There is an ray of optimism today
that we can perhaps arrest the state of drift in our regional cooperation
over these last years. Some mindsets may have to be altered and some historical
baggage jettisoned.
I am glad that President Musharraf
extended a hand of friendship to me I have shaken his hand in your presence.
Now President Musharraf must follow its gesture by not permitting any activity
in Pakistan or any territory in its control today which enables terrorists
to perpetuate mindless violence in India. I say this because of our past
experience. I went to Lahore with a hand of friendship. We were rewarded
by aggression in Kargil and the hijacking of the Indian Airlines aircraft
from Kathmandu. I invited President Musharraf to Agra. We were rewarded
with the terrorist attack on the Jammu and Kashmir assembly and last month
on the Parliament of India. But we would he betraying the expectations
of our peoples if we did not chart out the course towards satisfying the
unfulfilled promises of our common South Asian destiny.
Thank you.
