ISLAMABAD, Dec 30: The 12th Saarc summit is expected to discuss the establishment of rail, road and sea links to enhance political and economic cooperation among the member states.

“This issue is not on the agenda of the summit but officials of the member countries now holding a meeting in Islamabad, hope that it will come under discussion for the good of the region,” an official source told Dawn here on Tuesday.

He said the proposal for establishing rail, road and sea links had been there for a long time but could not come up due to unfriendly relations between India and Pakistan.

Now when the confidence-building measures were being taken by both sides, the South Asian countries were likely to take up the matter, the source said.

He said conversion of the existing South Asian Preferential Trade Agreement (Sapta) into South Asia Free Trade Area (Safta) would be discussed in detail during the Jan 4-6 summit. “While the member countries are showing their willingness to sign Safta, they are not averse to the idea of taking up the issue of having road, sea and rail links among all the seven countries,” the source said.

However, he said much depended on India to spur trade and economic cooperation in the region. The removal of non-tariff barriers was a good beginning to boost trade but it required a demonstration of large-heartedness, specially by India, he added.

“According to a safe estimate, Pakistan’s water cooler industry has an export potential of about one billion dollar. But when it comes to export water coolers to India, the Indian government asks Pakistani exporters to get a clearance from the Indian Water Cooler Association which obviously means no export to that country and thus no use of removing non-tariff barriers,” the source said.

In this regard he also mentioned Bangladesh’s inability of acquiring electricity from Nepal and Bhutan as New Delhi was not allowing these countries to lay a transmission line through Indian territory.

He said tall claims being made by India and Pakistan about poverty alleviation could not materialize unless there was a real cooperation between the member countries. He said reduction in duty on 700 items by Pakistan and on 500 items by India could hardly make any difference as these items were not frequently traded between the two countries.

India and Pakistan, he stressed, would have to soften their stand on various issues to help promote trade and economic activities from the Saarc platform.