BANGKOK, July 31: Seven Asian nations, led by India and Thailand, agreed on Saturday to expand their nascent cooperation on trade to fight transnational militancy and crime.

Leaders from Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Myanmar, Nepal, Sri Lanka and Thailand, while promising to finish their free trade talks on schedule, pledged to coordinate and exchange information to combat terrorism, they said in a joint statement.

The seven nations, with a combined population of 1.3 billion, said they had resolved to "continue active cooperation in ongoing efforts of the international community in combating terrorism in all its forms and manifestations".

The summit declaration did not give details, but Thai Prime Minster Thaksin Shinawatra told reporters India would soon host a meeting of senior officials of the seven countries to work on establishing an intelligence network.

In February, after seven years of talks, six of the countries signed a free trade pact aimed at boosting investment and lowering costs by 2017.

Bangladesh, which did not sign initially in fear lower tariffs might hurt its manufacturing, joined the pact last month after compensation issues were sorted out and its cabinet approved the agreement.

The seven members of the regional economic cooperation group, known as BIMST-EC, have a combined gross domestic product of more than 700 billion dollars, but the value of goods traded between them amounts to a mere three billion dollars.

Thaksin said that figure would "increase tremendously" once the trade pact was implemented fully.

Negotiations on reducing import duties on goods would last 16 months from September, then be followed by talks on services which were expected to be completed by 2006, Thai officials said.

The free trade pact, if implemented, would span much of South Asia, which has a population of more than 1.3 billion and Southeast Asia, home to 500 million people.

India, Sri Lanka and Thailand plan to charge no tariffs on each others' goods and services by July 2012, five years ahead of much poorer Bangladesh, Myanmar, Nepal and Bhutan.

Other areas of cooperation included transportation and communication links, interconnection of electricity and natural gas grids and renewable energy technologies, on which India would host a meeting next year.

The group changed its full name to Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation, or BIMSTEC, and its next summit would be hosted by India in 2006.-Reuters