NEW DELHI: India hosted BIMSTEC
foreign ministers
‘ retreat on Thursday with external affairs minister S Jaishankar urging his counterparts to harbour higher aspirations and send out a message that they are determined to infuse new energies, new resources and a new commitment into
cooperation
among the
Bay of Bengal
nations.
The Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) brings together seven countries of South and South-East Asia for multi-faceted cooperation.
The BIMSTEC Charter had come into effect from May 20 this year.
Addressing the retreat, Jaishankar said global and regional developments also made it imperative that the member-states find more solutions amongst ourselves.
“There are long-standing goals such as capacity-building and economic cooperation that have acquired a new urgency. And not least, a grouping that is so complementary and so congenial in its membership should surely harbour higher aspirations. Our hope is that these would be expressed as shared and ambitious BIMSTEC vision,” he said.
Since it blocked the SAARC summit process in 2016 because of Pakistan’s support to cross-border terrorism, India has increasingly focused on BIMSTEC to intensify cooperation with its neighbourhood.
“Each of these endeavours is being purposed with a specific focus on the Bay of Bengal, where collaborative potential has long remained under-realized. Our challenge is to change that for the better, and to do so rapidly. The retreat is meant to exchange ideas openly, candidly and fruitfully. Our message should be clear – that we are all determined to infuse new energies, new resources and a new commitment into cooperation among the Bay of Bengal nations,” said Jaishankar.
The discussions were focused on connectivity, institutional building, cooperation in
trade
and business, collaboration in health and space, digital public infrastructure, capacity building and societal exchanges, as well as weighing on the merits of new mechanisms, according to the minister.
