South Asian Association For Regional Cooperation (SAARC):

Formation: The South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) was established in December 8, 1985 at Dhaka by Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Srilanka. The objective were to promote the welfare and improve the quality of life of the people of South Asia by accelerating economic growth in the region and building up mutual trust among the member states. Objectives: The objectives of the Association as defined in the Charter are: i) To promote the welfare of the people of South Asia and to improve their quality of life. ii) To accelerate economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region and to provide all individuals the opportunity to live in dignity and to realize their full potential. iii) To promote and strengthen collective self-reliance among the countries of South Asia. iv) To contribute to mutual trust, understanding and appreciation of one anothers problems. v) Too promote active collaboration and mutual assistance in the economic, social, cultural, technical and scientific fields, vi) To strengthen cooperation with other developing countries. Principles: i) The principle of sovereign equality, territorial integrity, political independence, noninterference in the internal affairs of other states and mutual benefits. ii) The cooperation is to complement bilateral and multilateral relations. iii) Such cooperation should be consistent with bilateral and multilateral responsibilities of the member states.

iv) Decisions at all levels are to be unanimously taken. v) Bilateral and contentious issues would be executed from its deliberations. Membership: i) Pakistan ii) Bangladesh iii) India iv) Srilanka v) Nepal vi) Bhutan vii) Maldives vii) Afghanistan in April 2007, at the Associations 14th Summit, Afghanistan became its eighth member. Observers: i) Australia ii) China iii) EU iv) Iran v) Japan vi) Mauritius vii) Myanmar (Burma) viii) United States ix) South Korea Fields/Areas Of Cooperation: The areas of cooperation among SAARC members as decided at the time of its establishment were: i) Agriculture and Forestry ii) Health And Population Planning iii) Meteorology iv) Rural Development v) Telecommunication vi) Transport

vii) Science and Technology viii) Drug Trafficking And Abuse ix) Postal Service x) Women Development And xi) Sports, Arts And Culture Structure: The SAARC has four tier structure including: i) SAARC Summit Conference ii) Council of Minister iii) Standing Committee iv) Technical Committees and Secretariat SAARC Summit Conference: The highest decision-making authority rests with the SAARC Summit Conference convened generally once in a year or two years, comprising Heads of State or Governments of SAARC countries. Council Of Ministers: The Council Of Ministers of SAARC countries formulates policies of the organisation. The council appoints Secretary General of SAARC on the basis of rotation in alphabetical order for a period of two years, upon nomination by a member state. It meets twice a year. Standing Committee: The Standing Committee of SAARC is composed of Foreign Secretaries of member states: It approves projects and programmes. The financing of such programmes and project is also determined by the Standing Committee. Secretariat: The SAARC Secretariat was established in Kathmandu on 16 January 1987 and was inaugurated by late King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah of Nepal. It is headed by a Secretary General appointed by the Council of Ministers from member countries in alphabetical order for a three-year term. He is assisted by the Professional and the General Services Staff and also an appropriate number of functional units called divisions assigned to Directors on deputation from member States. The Secretariat coordinates and monitors implementation of activities, prepares for and services

meetings and serves as a channel of communication between the Association and its member states as well as other regional organisations. Achievements: Twenty-five years have passed since the establishment of SAARC in 1985. When we analyse its achievements disappointment prevails over us. The SAARC has not many achievements at its credit. However, it must be kept in mind that the Association consists of countries having diversity in culture, religion, economic development, foreign policy etc. It is itself an appreciable thing that these countries have come on one platform for their economic development. No doubt, SAARC performance is not good as was expected, yet it has some achievement at its credit. They are; i) It has developed feelings of understanding among countries. ii) It signed SAARC Regional Convention of Suppression of Terrorism in 1998. iii) It established SAARC Food Security Reserve which is operational since 1988. iv) The SAARC has also signed South Asia Professional Trade Agreement (SAPTA) in seventh summit in 1993 and SAFTA Agreement, signed during the 12th Summit in January 2004. v) SAARC Agricultural Information Centre (SAIC) has been set up at Dhaka to promote cooperation in the field of agricultural. vi) A Centre for Human Resource Development (CHRD) has also been established. vii) The member countries have devised modalities for confronting many important issues such a poverty, terrorism, drug-trafficking etc. viii) Institutional arrangements such as South Asian Development Bank, South Asian Development Fund etc. have been initiated.

Causes Behind Slow Progress: A birds eye view of the SAARCs achievements tells us that the performance of the Association is not satisfactory. Generally speaking, following are the reasons for the slow progress of SAARC. i) Indian aptitude is the foremost factor for the slow progress of SAARC. ii) There are flaws in the charter itself. According to one principle, bilateral issues are excluded from the activities of the Association. iii) Almost all the member countries are internally unstable and faced with internal political tension. iv) Many of many of the important sectors of economy which affect directly the lives of the people of the region have not been included in the Associations activity. The areas include: reduction in the defence expenditure, power generation, improvement and proper use of regional water resources, the use of SAARC for getting financial assistance from donor agencies. v) All the SAARC countries formulate their foreign policies according to their own national interests and objectives. This hinders to achieve any common ground and policy to make Association successful. vi) The extra regional alignment of the member countries is also a hindrance in the progress of the Association. Their alignment often works at cross purpose to the objectives aimed by SAARC. vii) Theres not the same level of economic development among countries. The imbalance of economic development creates tendency of domination, doubts and suspicions which create hurdles to achieve success. Pakistans Role In Strengthening SAARC: Pakistan has been an active and enthusiastic member of the SAARC. The twelfth SAARC Summit in Islamabad has highlighted Pakistans contribution in making SAARC a highly useful forum of South Asia. Pakistans tension ridden relations with India has never deterred it form playing an active role in the Association. Pakistan played a pivotal role in the formal launching of the SAARC at the first summit at Dhaka in 1985. After the formation of SAARC, Pakistan has lived up to its commitments by taking part

in all the activities of the SAARC. The broad objectives of the SAARC were to promote the welfare of the people of South Asia, accelerate economic growth, social progress and cultural development in the region. In all of SAARCs endeavours in the relevant fields, Pakistan has shown keen interest and played an active role. Pakistan has always played a leading role in both initiating and welcoming visits and exchanges with personalities from various fields of life in the member countries of the SAARC. It has always favoured the inclusion of mutual disputes and bilateral issues between member countries. Pakistan has argued that successful regional groupings like European Union and ASEAN use the mechanism of consultation for discussion that promote conciliation and strengthen peace. During the first Summit Pakistan gave a suggestion that womens participation should be increased in the SAARC related activities. The suggestion was welcomed and accepted as the SAARC leaders agreed that meaningful progress could not be achieved without the active participation and enhancement of the status of women. In the fifth SAARC Summit meeting Pakistan vetoed Afghanistans application for membership of SAARC because at that time it was under the Soviet influence. In addition Pakistan condemned Iraqi occupation of Kuwait. The sixth summit Conference of SAARC was held in Colombo on 21st December 1991. During this meeting Pakistan proposed to make Asia a nuclear free zone. Similarly in the subsequent SAARC Summits too Pakistan made positive proposals for the promotion of political, economic and cultural cooperation among the states. Political Issues: SAARC has intentionally laid more stress on core issues mentioned above rather than more decisive political issues like the Kashmir dispute and the Srilanka civil war. However, political dialogue is often conducted on the margins of SAARC meetings. SAARC has also refrained itself from interfering in the internal matters of the member states. During the 12th and 13th SAARC summits, extreme emphasis was laid upon greater cooperation between the SAARC members to fight against terrorism.

Political Economy Of South Asia:

South Asia accounts for nearly 23% of the total world population. However, its share in the global GDP is less than 3%. The region is home to the worlds 400 million poor, which means nearly 30% of the regions population lives below the poverty line. All SAARC countries have a rather low raking on the Human Development Index (HDI), which according to the Human Development Report 2007-08 is: Srilanka (99), the Maldives (100), India (128), Bhutan (133), Pakistan (136), Bangladesh (140), and Nepal (142). The HDI ranking is based on achievements in terms of life expectancy, education and real income. The low HDI ranking reflects poorly on these vital indicators in the region. South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA): In order to achieve objectives of SAARC and increase regional integration, the member countries created South Asian Free Trade Agreement (SAFTA) in 2004 at the twelfth SAARC Summit. This agreement which came into force on January 1, 2006 provides that members will reduce their tariffs to 0.5 per cent by December 31, 2005. The success of SAFTA, however, largely depends on normalization of Pakistan-India relations. In case the relations between the two countries do not normalize, SAFTA, a fate will not be different from that of its predecessor, South Asian Preferential Trade Agreement (SAPTA). Reasons Of Low Trade: the major reason for meagre intra-SAARC trade is low volume of trade between Pakistan and India, the largest economies and trading nations in the region. Though formal Pak-India trade (the two countries have informal trade of more than $ 3bn a year) has increased from $ 236 million in 2001-2002 to $ 1.95 bn in 2007-08, it still constitutes less than 1 per cent of the global trade of the two countries! Pakistan has not even granted MFN status, a basic requirement under WTO, to India and continues to conduct its imports from India on the basis of positive list. On its part, India maintains high tariffs and non-tariff barriers on products of export interest to Pakistan. SAARC And ASEAN: The poor trade performance of SAARC stands in marked contrast with that of the neighbouring regional alliance-Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN). The ASEAN countries accounts for merely 8.4% of the total world population. However, their share in total world trade is nearly 7%. ASEANs contribution to Asias total trade is 23 per cent. Intra-ASEAN trade accounts for nearly 30 per cent of the global trade of the

10-mmeber countries. ASEAN countries have remained embroiled in territorial disputes but that has not hampered their trade relations.
now that`s what i call current affairs notes roshan, yopu can see the difference yourself b/w your previous notes and these notes. good attempt regarding SAARC organisation. now add few points about how can southasian states strengthen saarc? do write about present developments under conferences heading. here is some info about SAARC summits No. Location Date 1st Dhaka 7-8 December 1985 2nd Bangalore 16-17 November 1986 3rd Kathmandu 2-4 November 1987 4th Islamabad 29-31 December 1988 5th Mal 21-23 November 1990 6th Colombo 21-Dec-91 7th Dhaka 10-11 April 1993 8th New Delhi 2-4 May 1995 9th Mal 12-14 May 1997 10th Colombo 29-31 July 1998 11th Kathmandu 4-6 January 2002 12th Islamabad 2-6 January 2004 13th Dhaka 12-13 November 2005 14th New Delhi 3-4 April 2007 15th Colombo 1-3 August 2008 16th Thimphu 28-29 April 2010 17th Mal November 2011 (Planned) andand give conclusion under that heading. now the topic in the last is a full fledge question and it has already come in ce 2011 difference b/w SAARC AND ASEAN. try to elaborate it more. the rest is good.keep it up