Washington keen to work closely with Dhaka

Washington is looking forward to work closely with Bangladesh to advance the mutual interests, US Ambassador to Bangladesh Peter Haas said yesterday after his first meeting with newly appointed Foreign Minister Hasan Mahmud.

“I had a meeting today [yesterday] so that we could talk about future of our relations and how we work together on the issues of mutual interests such as climate change, expanding business opportunities, and Rohingya,” Haas told reporters after the meeting at the foreign ministry.

The meeting, which lasted for about an hour, is significant given that the US was critical of the government for elections. Washington and its allies said Bangladesh’s national polls in 2014 and 2018 were mired with irregularities.

In May last year, Washington also announced a visa policy saying that those undermining democratic elections in Bangladesh will be denied visas.

The US said the January 7 parliamentary polls were not free or fair. It, however, spoke of continuing the relationship on trade and other areas of mutual interests.

Yesterday, Haas did not take any questions from journalists. The foreign minister spoke later.

Asked if they discussed elections, Hasan said the US envoy did not speak about it, but he thanked the US for sending several election observers.

He alleged that the BNP created anarchy and set fire to trains that led to the killing of people. The voter turnout in the national polls was about 42 percent, but it could have been at least 10 percentage point higher if there was no fog and cold, he added.

“Different countries have different opinions on elections, but the main thing is the US wants to work with the new government,” the minister said.

He said Haas agreed to strengthen bilateral relationship, diversify trade and investment, and work together on combating fanaticism and militancy like the US did in the past.

Talking about his meeting with European Union Ambassador Charles Whiteley, Hasan said they discussed European investment in the Special Economic Zones and the funding from the European financial institutions.

“I said that the Rohingya crisis has almost been forgotten because of the other crises like the Ukraine and Palestine, but that should not be the case. The Rohingya should be provided support before they are repatriated with their full rights of citizenship,” the minister said.

Whiteley said he spoke of boosting the relations in the areas of trade and investment and climate change.

He said the EU and Bangladesh will very soon start the negotiation on the Partnership Cooperation Agreement.

Whiteley said they want to have a new structure for the EU-Bangladesh relationship that would be much more political in nature.

Asked about the EU’s statement that it regretted that a major political party did not participate in the elections, Whiteley said the meeting was more forward-looking. “That does not mean that we forgot the past. The past is very important,” he said.

The EU election expert team is still in Dhaka. It will prepare a report including recommendations that will be made public. The EU will definitely follow those recommendations up, the envoy added.