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Indo-Pak tension will not derail SAARC summit, says Lanka

Sri Lankan Foreign Minister Lakshman Kadirgamar said on Sunday that the forthcoming summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Co-operation would be held on schedule.

Kadirgamar told newsmen before leaving Dhaka at the end of a brief visit to Bangladesh that he thought the current tension between India and Pakistan would not derail the biennial regional summit next month.

Sri Lanka is hosting the summit for the tenth time since SAARC was floated as a regional forum for economic co-operation in 1985 with Bhutan, Bangladesh, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka as members.

The three-day summit is scheduled to begin in Colombo in the second week of July.

Kadirgamar, refuting speculations that the summit would be put off due to escalating Indo-Pakistan tensions, said he did not believe either India or Pakistan would use the nuclear bomb.

He handed over a personal invitation from President Chandrika Kumaratunga to Bangladeshi Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina Wajed to attend the summit.

UNI

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