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| May 15, 2005 | Sunday | Rabi-us-Sani 6, 1426 |
South Asian parliamentary conference today
ISLAMABAD, May 14: The first-ever South Asian parliamentary conference opens in Islamabad on Sunday, but a last-minute sour note has came from strife-torn Nepal, whose delegates declined to travel to Pakistan after one of them was barred. The conference will discuss regional issues ranging from economic cooperation to water disputes. Possibilities of forming a South Asian parliament, evolving a human rights code, problems of security, press freedom and a joint power grid will be other issues to be discussed in eight sessions of the six-day conference hosted by a regional organisation of journalists.
While there was a question on participation of the representatives of five parties from Nepal, where parliament was dissolved in 2002, the representatives of 13 parties from India, four parties from Bangladesh and five parties from Sri Lanka began arriving here on Saturday.
Representatives of six ruling coalition and opposition parties in Pakistan have been invited to the conference, which, according to the organiser, South Asian Free Media Association (Safma), will also be addressed by President Pervez Musharraf on a date yet to be announced.
MPs from parties bitterly hostile to each other in their own countries, such as ruling Bangladesh Nationalist Party and opposition Awami League from Bangladesh and ruling Congress Party and opposition Bharatiya Janata Party from India are likely to share the same table in Safma forum — called South Asian Parliament.
National Assembly speaker Chaudhry Amir Hussain will be the chief guest of the inaugural session and the participants “will try to break new grounds to enhance regional cooperation”, Safma secretary-general Imtiaz Alam told a news conference on Saturday.
The conference, titled “Evolving South Asian Fraternity”, will move to Bhurban summer resort near Murree on Monday where separate sessions on South Asian vision, economic cooperation, water issues and energy grid, South Asian parliament, cooperative security in South Asia, and right to know and independence of media will be held from May 16 to 20, after which a conference declaration will be issued.
APPEAL TO NEPAL: Meanwhile the Safma secretary-general has appealed to Nepal’s King Gyanendra to allow former Nepalese MPs to participate in the conference. Nepalese army personnel had not allowed People’s Front general secretary Navaraj Subedi to enter airport to board a plane for Pakistan after which the whole delegation of former members of
the dissolved parliament decided not to travel without Mr Subedi.
PARTIES: India’s Congress and BJP parties have nominated eight parliamentarians each while 18 other Indian delegates will be from Rashtria Janata Dal, the Communist Party of India, the Communist Party of India-Marxists, the Revolutionary Socialist Party, Bahujan Samaj Party, Akali Dal, Telegu Desam Party, Lok Janshaki Party, Samajawadi Party, Janata Dal-United, and National Conference.
Those participating From Pakistan will be nine members of the ruling Pakistan Muslim League, eight of the People’s Party Parliamentarians, six each of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal and the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, four from the Pakistan Muslim League-Nawaz, two of PPP-Patriots and one of the Balochistan National Party.
From Bangladesh, Bangladesh Nationalist Party is sending five members, Awami League four, Jatiya Party one, and Jamaat-i-Islami one while one will be an independent MP.
Those who were to come from Nepal were three members each from the Nepali Congress and Communist Party of Nepal (CPN-UML), and one each from the Nepali Congress (D), the People’s Front Nepal, and National Democratic Party one member each.
From Sri Lanka will come four members from the United People’s Freedom Alliance, three of them being are ministers, four from the United National Party, two from the Tamil National Alliance two and one from the Sri Lanka Muslim Congress.
Also invited are 64 editors and senior journalists of the participating countries.
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