Bangladesh boosts cash ties with
China By Syed Tashfin Chowdhury
DHAKA - Bangladesh, under the hand of
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, has strengthened its
economic ties with China through a series of
agreements that will help boost the South Asian
country's tourism industry and power sector. Not
to be outdone, opposition leader Khaleda Zia
returned from a week-long trip to Beijing claiming
a breakthrough on plans to build an important
bridge that will link Dhaka with the east of the
country.
Sheikh Hasina's administration
signed a number of deals with Chinese officials
during and after an October 21 visit to Dhaka by a
delegation led by Li Changchun, a member of
China's top political body, the Politburo Standing
Committee.
China will disburse US$200
million as a soft loan to the Bangladesh
government to develop the airport in Cox's Bazar, in
the southeast of the
country, the country's top tourist spot and
promoted as having the longest beach in the world.
Work includes widening and lengthening the runway
and improving safety features to a standard that
will allow international flights. At present, the
nearest international airport is at Chittagong,
four hours away by road.
The agreement
involves the Civil Aviation Authority Bangladesh
and Avic International Engineering Co, under the
Aviation Industry Corporation of China.
Separately, in the biggest deal yet
involving a Bangladeshi private-sector company
with a Chinese company, Summit Bibiyana II Power
Company and First Northeast Electric Power
Engineering Company signed a $220 million deal to
build a 341MW power project in Habiganj by 2014.
Summit Bibiyana is a venture of Summit
Group in Bangladesh, which is owned by the family
of present Civil Aviation and Tourism Minister
Faruk Khan.
Other agreements covering
economic and technical cooperation including the
provision of US$226 million to implement a water
treatment plant at Dhaka Wasa, near Dhaka.
Khaleda Zia, leader of the opposition
Bangladesh Nationalist Party, returned from China
saying that Beijing has agreed to provide "all
help" in the construction of a second Padma
Bridge. Construction of the $3 billion bridge has
been delayed by concerns at the World Bank and
other backers over possible corruption in the
contracting process.
Khaleda Zia's China
visit was "fruitful", senior BNP member Khandaker
Mosharraf Hossain was quoted by United News of
Bangladesh as saying, Beijing has agreed "in
principle" to assist Bangladesh in constructing a
second Padma Bridge and an export processing zone
as proposed by Zia.
During her visit, BNP
met key Chinese leaders including Vice President
Xi Jingpin, Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi and Vice
Minister of the International Department of the
Chinese Communist Party Chen Fengxiang. According
to Mosharraf, Xi said China is ready to work with
Bangladesh towards establishing road and rail
links between Chittagong and Kunming in southwest
China, constructing a deep water port at Sonadia,
near Mongla, in southwest Bangladesh, and helping
to modernize the Bangladesh armed forces.
Mosharraf denied a claim by Mahbub-ul-Alam
Hanif, joint general secretary of the ruling Awami
League, that Khaleda went to China to complain
about the Bangladesh government. "Khaleda Zia did
not go to China willingly to complain against
anybody rather she had been there at the
invitation of CPC," he said.
Khaleda Zia
followed up her China visit with a week-long trip
to India at the invitation of the New Delhi
government. Zia has recently shifted away from the
BNP's former "anti-India" stance. At a meeting
with India's recently appointed Foreign Minister
Salman Khurshid in Hyderabad on October 30 she
said India-Bangladesh "connectivity" is
"inevitable".
Earlier, BNP had opposed
Bangladesh granting transit facilities for India
to connect its landlocked northeastern states with
the rest of the country - which a deep water port
at Sonadia would facilitate. She urged New Delhi's
participation in a consortium with China to build
the port. Khaleda said in India that her political
party "does not want to look back but wants to
look ahead and build a new era in relations
between the two countries".
In Dhaka,
Daily Star quoted senior BNP members as saying the
BNP increasingly realized that it much to for its
anti-India strategy and that India is now a big
factor in regional and international politics is
the reason behind this shift. Some went to on to
allege that Jamaat-e-Islami and Islami Oikya Jote,
two of the BNP's Islamist political allies since
2001, had persuaded Khaleda Zia to take up the
anti-India stance.
Khaleda and her team
are to visit the United Kingdom and United States
in December and January as these nations are
greatly significant for the BNP "in terms of their
political and economic influence over Bangladesh".
Syed Tashfin Chowdhury is the
Editor of Xtra, the weekend magazine of New Age,
in Bangladesh.
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