DHAKA: Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali on Thursday stressed on the need for enhanced commitment, responsibility and solidarity to durable peace and prosperity.
Ali was addressing at the 17th session of the Ministerial Meeting of the NAM Coordinating Bureau at the Algeria’s capital city Algiers.
According the Foreign Ministry press release, the minster also stressed the importance of the development mandate of the rules-based multilateral trading regime, the need for concluding the proposed international instrument on climate change by 2015, and the urgency of promoting safe and sound migration while securing the development dividends for sending, receiving and transit countries.
Ali said, “The essential plurality of NAM allows us to accommodate different dispensations within our membership, based on our mutual respect for each other’s sovereign rights and equality.”
“We are guided by the recognition that each one of our member states would have to find its own equilibrium and standing in the community of nations at its own pace and terms,” he added.
At the outset of his speech, Foreign Minister Ali recalled the memory of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman who led Bangladesh to join the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) at the Algiers Summit in 1973.
Ali said, “Inspired by his legacy, Bangladesh firmly believes in the continued relevance of NAM in the changed global realities… We must assure that the groundswell of solidarity that nurtures our Movement never dries up when the cause is just and legitimate.”
The Bangladesh Foreign Minister echoed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s words at the 16th NAM Summit in Tehran in June 2012 and urged the international community to keep working on reflecting the emerging global realities in the governing mechanisms of the key international institutions and processes.
He observed, “The global financial and economic crisis was a strong wake-up call to act upon this, but it seems there has been a reversal to business-as-usual. This cannot be acceptable to those most vulnerable to the systemic failures that caused the crisis.”
Focusing on the post-2015 sustainable development framework, the Bangladesh Foreign Minister observed, “The agenda for peace and development are inter-linked, and stand to gain from their complementarily in delivering global public goods that we aspire to achieve.”
Earlier in the day, the 17th NAM Ministerial Meeting started with the Algerian Foreign Minister Mr. Ramtane Lamamra in the Chair.
The opening session featured the President of Bolivia Evo Morales, as the current G-77 and China Chair, Algerian Prime Minister Abdelmalek Sellal, UN Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon (through video message) and the Foreign Minister of the Islamic Republic of Iran Dr. Mohammad Javad Zarif as the outgoing Chair.
Representatives of 120 member states of NAM attended the meeting and addressed the gathering. Prior to the Ministerial, the senior officials met here for two days to finalize a nearly 180 page document to be endorsed by the Ministers.
The Ministerial Meeting culminated in the adoption of an Algiers Declaration.
BDST: 1057 HRS MAY 30, 2014
