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The Standing Committee consisting of Foreign Secretaries of SAARC Countries concluded its deliberations with the adoption of its report and recommendations, Sri Lanka’s Foreign Ministry announced Friday. Foreign Minister of Sri Lanka Lakshman Kadirgamar, the Chairman of the SAARC Council of Ministers inaugurated the Standing Committee meeting on 9th August. He recalled that the mandate of the Special Session of the Standing Committee was to address and analyze issues of immediate relevance to regional cooperation in an ambience free of the constraints that held back its process in the recent past. Accordingly, the Standing Committee covered a wide array of issues of concern and interest to the region. There was full agreement on the need for an early resumption of the Summit process of SAARC. The Committee noted the offer of the Government of Nepal to convene the Eleventh SAARC Summit in Kathmandu in December 2001. All delegations stressed the need for the convening of the Summit as early as possible. Consultations on the finalization of the dates are proceeding. The Summit would be preceded by the Meetings of the Council of Ministers and the Standing Committee. It was decided that an additional half a day will be devoted at the next Session of the Standing Committee in Kathmandu for the deliberations of the Report of the Group of Eminent Persons (GEP). The Standing Committees approved the report of the Meeting of the Preparatory Committee of Senior Officials that preceded its session on 7 and 8 August 2001. In a measure intended to help save time for the Standing Committee, the members of which were slated to hold bilateral meetings in Colombo, the Preparatory Committee had taken upon itself the consideration of certain items which originally remained part of the Agenda of the Standing Committee. The suggestions of the Preparatory Committee on such issues were adopted accordingly. The Committee agreed on a definite time-frame for holding the meetings of various Committees and groups which could not meet earlier, including on the trade negotiations under SAPTA, drafting of the SAFTA Treaty arrangement, telecommunications, poverty alleviation, information, health, culture, media and environment. Some of these areas will be addressed by appropriate Ministerial level meetings for which the concerned member states would announce dates through the SAARC Secretariat. Recognizing the importance of addressing international trade issues that would come up for deliberation at the Fourth WTO Ministerial meeting to be held in Doha in mid November, the Committee welcomed the offer of India to host the Meeting of Commerce Secretaries and Commerce Ministers on 23 and 24 August 2001 in New Delhi. This will be followed by the Eleventh Meeting of the Committee on Economic Cooperation in Colombo in December 2001. The Secretary-General of SAARC had briefed the Committee on the ongoing consultations the SAARC Secretariat is engaged in with international and regional organizations that wished to facilitate the implementation of various SAARC programmes and projects. The Committee authorized the Secretariat to continue such initiatives under intimation to the member states. The Reports of the SAARC Coordination of Drug Law Enforcement Agencies, the Report of the Meeting of the Legal Experts on the Implementation of the SAARC Convention on Suppression of Terrorism, and the Inter-Governmental Group of Experts on the Social Charter were also approved, along with the schedule of activities recommended by the SAARC bodies. Emphasizing the importance of restructuring and rationalizing the functioning of the Regional Centres, it was agreed that the SAARC Secretary-General would conduct a performance audit of all Centers and report to the Standing Committee.
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