The BCIM (Bangladesh–China–India–Myanmar Forum for Regional Cooperation) initiative involves transportation of goods from a country to another rather than giving transit to India, State Minister for Foreign Affairs Md Shahriar Alam has said.
“This is not what we understand as giving transit to India,” he said at a joint press briefing held in the city yesterday.
Governor of China’s Yunnan Province Li Jiheng also attended the briefing but did not speak.
A six-member delegation led by Li arrived in Dhaka on Saturday for a three-day official visit and was received by the Foreign Secretary Md Shahidul Haque at the airport.
Shahriar Alam said Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina and Li Jiheng had discussed the BCIM initiative.
The Yunnan Province governor invited the prime minister to attend the 2nd China-South Asia Exposition, scheduled to be held in Kunming on 5-6 June this year.
“The prime minister told the Chinese delegation that she would seriously consider attending the programme if the exposition schedule did not clash with the budget session,” Shahriar Alam said.
Bangladesh was the theme country in the first China-South Asia Exposition and this time the theme country will be Nepal.
Shahriar also expressed Bangladesh’s optimism about the BCIM economic corridor framework, hoping that business and people-to-people contact would be enhanced between Bangladesh and Yunnan Province because of it.
With regard to investment, Shahriar informed the Chinese official that Bangladesh was thinking about the possibility of allocating land for a Chinese exclusive economic zone.
Meanwhile, a press release from the Foreign Ministry said the prime minister, at the meeting, mentioned that an airline route to Kunming had already been established and there should now be steps to build a road connection.
The premier recalled a decision that was taken to establish a road connection from Kunming to Bangladesh through Myanmar, during her last visit to Kunming. She hoped the Myanmar authorities would look into it for greater economic benefits to the region as a whole.