ISLAMABAD, Feb 16: Pakistan is likely to soon propose a new date falling at the year’s end for the 12th summit of the seven-nation South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (Saarc), Dawn learnt through well-placed government sources.

“The new dates for the Saarc summit are in the last quarter of this year,” a senior official involved in the process of proposing fresh dates for the summit told Dawn on Sunday.

A summary proposal for the 12th summit had been recently sent to the PM Secretariat for approval of Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali, the sources said.

Once the prime minister gives a go-ahead the dates would be communicated to the Saarc Secretariat, which in turn would inform the member states for their consent.

The 12th Saarc summit was slated for Jan 11 to 13 in Islamabad but it had to be postponed owing to non-confirmation of participation by India and Bhutan. It was on the recommendation of Indian Foreign Minister Yashwant Sinha that the summit had been scheduled for January.

According to Saarc charter a summit cannot take place if even one member state decides to abstain from it.

The 12th Saarc summit was not the first summit to be postponed. Previously two summits have been postponed, one in 1991 and the other in 1999.