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Asia Trade Group Formed
- Subject: Asia Trade Group Formed
- From: ausgeo@xxxxxxx
- Date: Sat, 07 Jun 1997 06:25:00
06/06/1997
Asia Trade Group Formed
By VIKAS BAJAJ
BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) -- Hoping to capitalize on South Asia's booming
population to become a economic powerhouse, four countries bordering the
Indian Ocean formed a trade group Friday.
Foreign ministry officials from India, Thailand, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka
signed the trade pact. They said Burma, despite international criticism of its
human rights record, would join the group within a year.
Trade among the countries totals only $1 billion, but with a combined
population of 1.3 billion people, optimism abounds that regional trade can
expand quickly in the next decade.
``The market potential is there,'' said Kobsak Chutikul, director of economic
affairs at the Thai Foreign Ministry. ``This is the time to bring this
subdivision together.''
Burma originally expressed interest in becoming a founding member of the trade
group. Representatives of the pact's member countries said, without
elaborating, that Burma was ``not ready'' for full membership but would be
within a year.
Bismillahir Rahim, a senior Bangladeshi official, told reporters that
repression of Burma's democratic opposition by the ruling military would not
bar its membership.
Burma won approval last week to join the Association of Southeast Asian
Nations in July. ASEAN rejected calls by many countries, including the United
States, to deny Burma admission's to protest of its treatment of the
pro-democracy movement led by 1991 Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi.
Officials hope the new trade group will link ASEAN, in which Thailand is a key
member, and the South Asian Association of Regional Countries, which includes
India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh.
The group -- to be known as the Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka,
Thailand-Economic Cooperation -- has already discussed forming a regional
airline, owned by all four governments, to serve smaller destinations in each
country.
Other possible projects include boosting tourism to Buddhist religious sites
in all four countries, said Saleem Shervani, an Indian government minister.