News analysis: SAARC undergoing growing pains

By Rao Bo, Chen Zhanjie

Colombo, Aug. 1 (Chinese media) -- The 15th South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Summit, which will kick off in the Sri Lankan capital Colombo on Saturday, attracts more attention as well as criticism.

The leaders of SAARC countries meet

With a theme called "Partnership for our people," the 15th summit will focus on terrorism, food security, energy and other issues.

The SAARC was established when its charter was formally adopted on Dec. 8, 1985 by the heads of state or government of Bangladesh, Bhutan India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka. The SAARC summit remains a meeting among member countries until 2007 when five observers including China, Japan, the Republic of Korea, the United States of America and the European Union were invited to attend the 14th summit in New Delhi, India.

Afghanistan joined the SAARC at the 14th summit held in New Delhi in April 2007. Iran was granted the status of observer for the organization at the 14th summit. Australia and Myanmar are likely to become SAARC observers at the coming 15th summit.

A Turkish reporter called Turkmen Terzi working with Cihan News Agency told Chinese media at the media center for the 15th SAARC Summit that people in Turkey were keeping a close eye on the SAARC summit because they wanted to know what was going on in this region.

"We procure goods from China and sell them on European markets," Terzi said, "South Asia is very important geologically because our goods are transferred through it."

Some other countries are interested in the summit because they have their own interest in the region, Terzi said, adding that the influence of SAARC had been increasing.

However, analysts pointed out that numerous agreements and contracts had been signed at SAARC Summits but they remained on paper afterwards.

The mammoth budget for the 15th Summit draws fire among people in Sri Lanka. Complaining of the inflation and high oil prices, many people think the summit is just a waste of money with little hope of achieving substantial results.

The South Asian Free Trade Area (SAFTA) is an important initiative taken at the 12th SAARC summit in Islamabad, capital of Pakistan on Jan. 6, 2004. The SAARC countries signed a framework SAFTA agreement with zero customs duty on the trade of practically all products in the region by the end of 2016.

The SAFTA is widely considered as one of the concrete steps taken by SAARC to promote trade cooperation in the region. The new agreement SAFTA, came into being in 2006 and will be operational following the ratification from the governments of SAARC member states. However, the SAARC governments have not reached a consensus on it thus it is still not operational.

Analysts say that the SAARC member countries can not reach a consensus easily because, more often than not, their differences outweigh their common interest.

India is most powerful in the region and other member states are no rival to it in terms of economic and political influence in the world. The imbalance of power among the organization will, to a great extent, hamper the development of SAARC because small countries are wary of the dominance of India in the region, a study published by Stanford Journal of International Relations said.

The relationship between India and Pakistan plays a crucial role for regional peace and stability. Their relations have undergone ups and downs despite the composite dialogues between them.

The Indian and Pakistani troops exchanged fires around on the Line of Control just two days before the commencement of the summit. Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi held bilateral talks with his Indian counterpart and said at a news conference on Thursday that the two countries should stop finger pointing and let ceasefire continue.

Analysts said SAARC could barely gain ground as long as the suspicion among its members prevailed. The countries in the region have to make every effort to consolidate political stability, leaving the SAARC irrelevant in a sense.

Talking to Chinese media on Wednesday, a Sri Lankan Foreign Ministry official, on condition of anonymity, said that people should not expect much from SAARC Summit.

"Although little progress has been made in terms of implementation, each SAARC summit witnesses a step forward," he said, adding that the transformation of SAARC was under way.