WNAM REPORT: In the first week of October, a series of meetings and round-tables took place in Washington, DC, culminating in a lunch hosted by Pakistan’s Ambassador to USA, Amb Rizwan Saeed. The members of the delegation apprised the Ambassador of the formation a core group under the initiative “Pakistan and South Asia: Towards Progress, Partnership and Peace”.
The Convener of the group is Mr. Imran Shauket and the group consists of former ambassador rank officers of U.S, former Mission Directors of USAID, Director South Asia of various U.S. think tanks, notable Pakistani personalities as well as diaspora members.
The group will be expanded to include partners from Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and other South Asian nations. The common background of the core team is their experience of serving in Pakistan, among other South Asian nations.
In the introduction and vision of the group, Imran highlighted that South Asia consists of 25% of the population of the world yet it is the least integrated of any region. For the sake of the people, the countries of the region need to come together in a different paradigm since SAARC has not come to fruition.
Barring regional integration, sub-regional integration needs to take place and countries need to find common grounds and launch confidence building measures.
The group, with their vast background and ties in Pakistan and South Asia, have identified areas of mutual cooperation and will be working to bring together Pakistan, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka in the first phase and subsequently expanding to other regional nations.
