Trackback URL
Download PDF Saarc legal experts have been asked to finalise the draft of the Mutual Legal Assistance (MLA) treaty on criminal matters as the member states failed to reach an agreement on an earlier draft prepared by India at the recent Saarc home ministers’ conference.
Formation of the regional police forum, Saarcpol, in the style of Europol, has also been deferred as the member states opined that more work needs to be done in this regard.
“We need to examine further before taking any decision regarding the MLA treaty because there are many aspects including huge funding,” LGRD Adviser Anwarul Iqbal told reporters at a briefing at the LGRD ministry yesterday.
Anwar led the Bangladesh delegation at the second home minister-level meeting during October 23-26 in New Delhi.
At their meeting on October 24 the Saarc home secretaries decided to postpone signing of the MLA treaty, an agreement aiming at synchronising legal frameworks to tackle cross-border crimes.
“The home secretaries thought that they did not get enough time to examine the draft treaty prepared by India,” said Home Secretary Abdul Karim, who was on the nine-member Bangladesh delegation that returned home Saturday.
On receipt of the inputs on the draft, the Saarc Secretariat will compile them and then the legal experts will meet in Colombo in April 2008 to finalise the treaty.
Bangladesh’s opinion on the draft distributed among the member states before the meeting is almost ready awaiting some final work.
The home ministers’ conference discussed various issues, including drugs and human trafficking, and reviewed progresses made by the Saarc Drug Offence Monitoring and the Saarc Terrorist Offence Monitoring desks.
“The member states reiterated last year’s statement that the desks are not effective,” said Anwarul Iqbal, adding that the desks will be made effective and will be brought under a regional information network so that the member states get necessary information easily.
Raising the incidents of alarming spread of Yaba and other drugs in recent years, the Bangladesh delegation put strong emphasis on strengthening the Saarc drug monitoring desk.
“We have made a strong point on narcotics and said the young generation is being badly affected by the spread of drugs,” said the LGRD adviser, also a former inspector general of police.
The home ministers’ conference on October 25 was preceded by meetings of the Saarc police chiefs and home secretaries on October 23 and 24. The conference decided to hold the Saarc police chiefs’ meet twice a year.
The third Saarc home ministers’ conference will be held in Pakistan in 2008 and the next in Afghanistan in 2009.
On the sidelines of the meet, the LGRD adviser had bilateral talks with Indian Labour Minister Oscar Fernandes and paid a courtesy call on Indian Rural Development Minister Dr Raghuvansh Prasad Singh.
Anwar also called on the Afghanistan home minister and urged him to take steps to rescue abducted Brac employee Nurul Islam alive.
“The Afghanistan home minister said they have some information and expressed hope that the abducted Brac staff can be rescued soon,” said Anwar.
Asked if there was any bilateral talk with India on extradition of criminals hiding in the two countries, the adviser said, “It was not discussed, neither was it on the agenda.”
Comments are not moderated and only expresses personal views of visitors. BangladeshNews.com.bd is not responsible for commets posted by visitors.
Leave a Reply