Pokhara, March 17

Prime Minister KP Sharma Oli today singled out poverty as the main enemy of South Asia that has thwarted development and prosperity in the entire region of over 1.6 billion people.

Delivering his inaugural address at the 37th Foreign Ministerial meeting of SAARC countries at Hotel Grande in Pokhara this morning, he stressed on a concerted effort to reduce pervasive poverty and uplift the living condition of South Asians.

“At any cost we cannot afford this enemy to win,” he said. “We need to act collectively to annihilate this common enemy.”

The day-long ministerial meeting, also known as Mini-SAARC Summit, reviewed the implementation of the decisions contained in the Kathmandu Declaration 2014 and worked out agenda for consideration at the 19th SAARC Summit to be held in Pakistan.

PM Oli is the incumbent Chair of SAARC, with Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan and Sri Lanka as members.

He highlighted the need of structural transformation to achieve prosperity and success in fight against poverty and

backwardness.

In his address, the prime minister also stressed connectivity of infrastructure, ideas, knowledge, markets, literature and cultures to achieve the shared dream of South Asian prosperity.

He said Nepal’s focus was on socio-economic transformation, adding that a peaceful, stable, democratic and prosperous Nepal would also be the interest of entire South Asia region.

Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Kamal Thapa called for a major departure in mode of regional cooperation to realise SAARC’s vision and dream.

Secretary General of SAARC Arjun Bahadur Thapa said the much talked about Motor Vehicle and Railway Service Agreements would finalise soon to effectively connect and integrate the South Asia.

India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj said New Delhi had moved forward on unilateral initiatives announced during the last SAARC Summit by Prime Minister Narendra Modi to share India’s progress on science and technology, including the Satellite for SAARC with fellow SAARC members.

“Connectivity is central to development. Economic, cultural and people-to-people contacts will flow naturally from connectivity,” Swaraj was quoted as saying in a tweet posted by Vikas Swarup, spokesperson for Ministry of External Affairs of India.