Date set for delayed Asian summit

Shaukat Aziz said he might meet India's PM on the sidelines

A twice-postponed Asian regional summit is to be held in Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, on 12 and 13 November.

Pakistan's Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz made the announcement in his capacity as chairman of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation.

The summit was delayed because of the Asian tsunami, and then because India objected to the political situation in Nepal and security in Bangladesh.

Top of the agenda is expected to be a South Asian free trade zone.

Jinnah row

December's tsunami had forced the original dates back to February.

But India refused to attend then because of the political crisis in Nepal, where King Gyanendra had dismissed the government and seized power, and security concerns in Bangladesh.

SAARC MEMBERS Bangladesh Bhutan India Maldives Nepal Pakistan Sri Lanka

Dhaka angrily denied it had any security problems.

Prime Minister Aziz said the summit in Dhaka, Saarc's 13th, would build on the initiatives launched during the last Saarc meeting in Islamabad in January 2004.

Mr Aziz, in announcing the date, did not rule out the possibility of a meeting with his Indian counterpart, Manmohan Singh, on the sidelines but said arrangements for such talks had yet to be finalised.

Mr Aziz said the dispute between India and Pakistan over Kashmir had in the past been a major stumbling block in making Saarc a viable forum.

However, he said it was a meeting on the sidelines of the summit in Islamabad last year that provided the two countries with an opportunity to improve relations.

Mr Aziz also refused to comment on the controversy in India following opposition Bharatiya Janata Party leader LK Advani's comment that he believed Pakistan's founder, Mohammed Ali Jinnah, was, "a secularist". Mr Jinnah is still widely blamed for the partition of India because of his drive for a Muslim homeland.

Mr Aziz said Jinnah was respected not just in Pakistan but all over the world as a great leader who carved out a homeland for the Muslims of the subcontinent.

Mr Advani resigned as party president following criticism from the BJP but after much persuasion took back his resignation on Friday.