Kathmandu, May 5

The 11th informal meeting of SAARC finance ministers was held in Yokohama, Japan today, on the sidelines of the 50th annual meeting of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) being held from May 4 to 7.

The meeting, attended by finance ministers or heads of delegations from all SAARC member states, was held under the chairmanship of Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Krishna Bahadur Mahara, as per a media release issued by SAARC Secretariat here today.

All finance ministers or heads of delegations briefed the meeting about the current status of economic progress achieved by them.

Secretary General of SAARC, Amjad Hussain B Sial, thanked ADB for its continued support to SAARC in its journey towards regional economic integration, leading to South Asian Economic Union, since the signing of SAARC-ADB memorandum of understanding in 2004 and hoped that ADB would continue to support SAARC in the future as well.

During the opening session of the meeting, Wencai Zhang, vice president of ADB, briefed the meeting about the projects undertaken by ADB in the 50 years of its existence. He stated that the ADB has a long and productive partnership with SAARC countries, according to the release.

He also informed the meeting that as of 2016-end, ADB’s cumulative assistance to the sub-region totalled $108.6 billion, amounting to more than 40 per cent of ADB’s financing operations.