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SAARC meet on transport linkages

NEW DELHI: Foreign Ministers of SAARC (South Asia Association for Regional Cooperation) will meet here on Friday to discuss transport links in order to improve regional connectivity. They will take a view on applications by Mauritius and Australia for enrolment as observers to the eight-nation group.

Briefing newspersons at the end of the SAARC Standing Committee meeting, Foreign Secretary Shivshanker Menon said the Foreign Ministers would consider taking up work on seven intra-regional transport projects to move SAARC “from the declaratory phase to the implementation phase.”

The projects include ferry services connecting Colombo, Kochi and Tuticorin, a rail corridor between Chennai and Colombo, Agartala-Chittagong and Kathmandu-Kolkata road corridors and extending the rail link on the border with Bhutan.

The Foreign Ministers will consider air connectivity among New Delhi and Male and Islamabad.

They will also take up the applications of Mauritius and Australia for observer status.

The grouping already has six observers in the European Union, China, Republic of Korea, Japan, the U.S. and Iran. Tehran was the latest addition at the previous SAARC summit held here earlier this year.

The Foreign Ministers will put up their recommendations for consideration by the heads of state summit scheduled in Maldives.

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