PM is expected to visit India in September: Momen

ZOOMBANGLA DESK: Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina is expected to visit New Delhi in early September in line with the invitation of her Indian counterpart Narendra Modi, Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen today said here.

“The probable date of the Honorable Prime Minister’s New Delhi visit could be within first 10 days of September,” he told newsmen at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport here on his arrival from the Indian capital after joining the Bangladesh-India Joint Consultative Commission (JCC).

Momen, however, said, the Bangladesh premier’s office would finalise the date while the timeline was proposed during his talks with his counterpart Dr S Jaishankar and both Dhaka and Delhi were looking forward the planned visit to New Delhi.

He said Dhaka and New Delhi decided to implement the bilateral decisions ahead of Sheikh Hasina’s India tour while Dhaka expected the much-awaited Joint River Commission (JRC) meeting to be held by then.

The Bangladesh foreign minister and Indian external affairs minister co-chaired the 7th round of JCC in New Delhi on Sunday.

Commenting on the JCC meeting Momen said, Dhaka had raised all outstanding issues with New Delhi including water sharing and border killing.

“We had a very good meeting,” he said adding that the Indian side showed “good response” to water management of trans-boundary streams between the two countries.

The foreign minister said they also discussed the issue of bringing back fugitive Bangladeshi businessman and former NRB Global Bank Managing Director Proshanta Kumar Halder alias PK Halder.

“New Delhi assured us to handover Halder to Bangladesh authority after exhausting some legal procedures in India,” he said. (BSS)