This content was published on September 06, 2022 – 10:11 am September 06, 2022 – 10:11 am
New Delhi, 6 September (EFE) .- Trade, connectivity and distribution of water from shared rivers have been the focus of Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s visit to neighboring India, where the President will remain until next Thursday.
“Connectivity, trade, investment, water resource management, security and credit lines were some of the issues we discussed,” Hasina said during a ceremony in New Delhi where both countries, accompanied by their Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, exchanged seven memoranda of understanding.
Modi noted that Bangladesh “is India’s largest development partner and our largest trading partner in the region.”
A bilateral trade that Modi said is “growing rapidly” as the two countries negotiate a full Economic Association Agreement after Hasina gave the green light to the process last August.
Bangladesh is set to exit the Least Developed Countries list in 2026, reflecting the advances this Asian nation has seen over the past few decades, but this ‘graduation’ to a developing country implies a loss of trade advantages that Dhaka would gain from an agreement with India wants to fix.
The two leaders also celebrated the inauguration of the first unit of the Maitree Coal-Fired Thermal Power Plant being built in Bangladesh with the support of around US$1.6 billion in loans from India.
The project, which will be the country’s largest with a capacity of 1,320 megawatts, has been criticized for its environmental impact as it is located just a few kilometers from the world’s largest mangrove swamp.
Hasina and Modi also signed an agreement to distribute water from the Kushiyara River, which flows between the two countries. However, river disputes between India and Bangladesh are far from resolved, as Hasina pointed out in reference to a decades-long treaty over the Teesta River.
“We hope pending issues, including a Teesta water-sharing agreement, will be completed soon,” the Bangladesh leader said.
Hasina and Modi have strengthened their ties in recent years, although China’s influence in Bangladesh worries New Delhi.
Dhaka is counting on Beijing’s influence to advance the repatriation of hundreds of thousands of members of the persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority to neighboring Burma, a pledge Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi reiterated during an official visit to Bangladesh last August. EFE
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