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US seeks to reassert global leadership role in struggle for human dignity, liberty
The United States on Tuesday released 2021 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices and said they will continue to support those around the world struggling for human dignity and liberty.
There is much progress to be made in the United States and globally, reads the report. By working together, the US said, they can come closer to building a world where respect for human rights is truly universal.
US Secretary of State Antony J. Blinken delivered on-camera remarks on the release of the global report at the US Department of State.
READ: US seeks equitable treatment of all businesses in Bangladesh
Promoting respect for human rights and defending fundamental freedoms are central to the US.
Required by US law to be produced annually, the Biden administration in its first two years has clearly attached much more weight to their findings than was seen during the Republican administration of Donald Trump. The reports document the status of human rights and worker rights in 198 countries and territories.
The stability, security, and health of any country depends on the ability of its people to freely exercise their human rights – to feel safe and included in their communities while expressing their views or gender, loving who they love, organizing with their coworkers, peacefully assembling, living by their conscience, and using their voices and reporting from independent media to hold governments accountable, according to the US Department of State.
Building on longstanding allegations with regards to Bangladesh, the latest US report on the country claims that the government took few measures to investigate and prosecute cases of corruption, and also of abuse and killing by security forces.
Experts say US suspension of COVID aid will prolong pandemic
In the latest Senate package targeted at stopping the coronavirus, U.S. lawmakers dropped nearly all funding for curbing the virus beyond American borders, a move many health experts slammed as dangerously short-sighted.
They warn the suspension of COVID-19 aid for poorer countries could ultimately allow the kind of unchecked transmission needed for the next worrisome variant to emerge and unravel much of the progress achieved so far.
The U.S. has been the biggest contributor to the global pandemic response, delivering more than 500 million vaccines, and the lack of funding will be a major setback. The money has paid for numerous interventions, including a mass vaccination campaign in the Cameroonian capital that saw hundreds of thousands of people get their first dose, as well as the construction of a COVID-19 care facility in South Africa and the donation of 1,000 ventilators to that country.
Other U.S.-funded vaccination campaigns in dozens of countries, including Uganda, Zambia, Ivory Coast and Mali, could also come to a grinding halt.
Also read: US experts wrestle with how to update COVID-19 vaccines
“Any stoppage of funds will affect us,” said Misaki Wayengera, a Ugandan official who heads a technical committee advising the government on the pandemic response. He said Uganda has leaned heavily on donor help — it received more than 11 million vaccines from the U.S. — and that any cuts “would make it very difficult for us to make ends meet.”
“This is a bit of a kick in the teeth to poor countries that were promised billions of vaccines and resources last year in grand pledges made by the G7 and the G20,” said Michael Head, a global health research fellow at Britain’s Southampton University.
“Given how badly we’ve failed on vaccine equity, it’s clear all of those promises have now been broken,” he said, adding that without concerted effort and money to fight COVID-19 in the coming months, the pandemic could persist for years.
While about 66% of the American population has been fully immunized against the coronavirus, fewer than 15% of people in poorer countries have received a single dose. Health officials working on COVID-19 vaccination in developing countries supported by the U.S. say they expect to see a reversal of progress once the funds disappear.
“Vaccination will stop or not even get started in some countries,” said Rachel Hall, executive director of U.S. government advocacy at the charity CARE. She cited estimates from USAID that the suspended funding would mean scrapping testing, treatment and health services for about 100 million people.
Although vaccines are more plentiful this year, many poorer countries have struggled to get shots into arms and hundreds of millions of donated vaccines have either expired, been returned or sat unused. To address those logistical hurdles, U.S. aid has financed critical services in countries across Africa, including the safe delivery of vaccines, training health workers and fighting vaccine misinformation.
For example, in November the U.S. Embassy in the Cameroonian capital set up a tent for mass vaccination: Within the first five days, more than 300,000 people received a dose. Those kinds of events will now be harder to conduct without American funds.
Hall also noted there would be consequences far beyond COVID-19, saying countries struggling with multiple disease outbreaks, like Congo and Mali, would face difficult choices.
“They will have to choose between fighting Ebola, malaria, polio, COVID and more,” she said.
Jeff Zients, the outgoing leader of the White House COVID-19 task force, expressed regret the legislation doesn’t include resources for the international pandemic fight, noting that would also compromise efforts to track the virus’ genetic evolution.
“It is a real disappointment that there’s no global funding in this bill,” he said. “This virus knows no borders, and it’s in our national interest to vaccinate the world and protect against possible new variants.”
Still, Zients announced the U.S. would be the first to donate “tens of millions” of doses for children to poorer countries and said more than 20 nations had already requested the shots.
J. Stephen Morrison, director of the Global Health Policy Center at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, lamented that lawmakers were erring on the side of optimism about the pandemic precisely when another surge might be arriving.
Also read: India reports first case of XE Covid variant
“We’ve made that mistake several times in this pandemic. And we may be making that mistake again,” he said. In recent weeks, COVID-19 cases caused by the hugely infectious omicron subvariant BA.2 have surged across Europe, and American officials say they expect a U.S. spike soon.
Other experts worried the suspension of U.S. global support for COVID-19 might prompt officials to drop current vaccination goals. The World Health Organization had set a target of immunizing at least 70% of people in all countries by the middle of this year, but with nearly 50 countries vaccinating fewer than 20% of their populations, hitting that target is highly unlikely.
Instead, some organizations like the Rockefeller Foundation have pushed for officials to “refocus vaccination goals away from vaccinating 70% of all adults by summer to vaccinating 90% of those most at-risk in each country,” in what some critics say is an implicit acknowledgment of the world’s repeated failures to share vaccines fairly. Others point out there shouldn't be competing vaccine targets and that health authorities simply need to do more, rather than adjusting global goals.
In Nigeria, which has so far received at least $143 million in COVID-19 aid from the U.S, authorities dismissed suggestions their coronavirus programs would suffer as a result of lost funding. The Nigerian president’s office said help from the U.S. was mostly “in kind” via capacity building, research support and donations of laboratory equipment and vaccines. “We are confident that this will not cause any disruption of our current programs,” it said.
However, others warned the U.S. decision set an unfortunate precedent for global cooperation to end the pandemic at a time when fresh concerns like the Ukraine war are drawing more attention.
U.S. President Joe Biden originally planned to convene a virtual summit in the first quarter of this year to keep international efforts on track, but no event has been scheduled.
“In light of the ongoing war in Ukraine, we don’t yet have a final date for the summit, but we are working closely with countries and international partners to advance commitments,” said a senior Biden administration official who was not authorized to comment publicly.
As of this month, WHO said it had gotten only $1.8 billion of the $16.8 billion needed from donors to speed access to coronavirus vaccines, medicines and diagnostics.
“Nobody else is stepping up to fill the void at the moment and the U.S. decision to suspend funding may lead other donor countries to act similarly,” said Dr. Krishna Udayakumar, director of Duke University’s Global Health Innovation Center.
Keri Althoff, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, described the U.S. suspension of funding as “devastating.”
“How could this possibly be what we’re debating right now?" she asked. “It’s a moral obligation to the rest of the world to continue to contribute to this global pandemic response, not only to protect ourselves but to protect people from around the world.”
Ukrainian refugees find route to US goes through Mexico
Hundreds of Ukrainian refugees arriving daily have a message for family and friends in Europe: the fastest route to settle in the United States is booking a flight to Mexico.
A loose volunteer coalition, largely from Slavic churches in the western United States, is guiding hundreds of refugees daily from the airport in the Mexican border city of Tijuana to hotels, churches and shelters, where they wait two to four days for U.S officials to admit them on humanitarian parole. In less than two weeks, volunteers worked with U.S. and Mexican officials to build a remarkably efficient and expanding network to provide food, security, transportation, and shelter.
The volunteers, who wear blue and yellow badges to represent the Ukrainian flag but have no group name or leader, started a waiting list on notepads and later switched to a mobile app normally used to track church attendance. Ukrainians are told to report to a U.S. border crossing as their numbers approach, a system that organizers liken to waiting for a restaurant table.
“We feel so lucky, so blessed,” said Tatiana Bondarenko, who traveled through Moldova, Romania, Austria and Mexico before arriving Tuesday in San Diego with her husband and children, ages 8, 12, and 15. Her final destination was Sacramento, California, to live with her mother, who she hadn’t seen in 15 years.
Also read:Mariupol’s dead put at 5,000 as Ukraine braces in the east
Another Ukrainian family posed nearby for photos under a U.S. Customs and Border Protection sign at San Diego's San Ysidro port of entry, the busiest crossing between the U.S. and Mexico. Volunteers under a blue canopy offered snacks while refugees waited for family to pick them up or for buses to take them to a nearby church.
At the Tijuana airport, weary travelers who enter Mexico as tourists in Mexico City or Cancun are directed to a makeshift lounge in the terminal with a sign in black marker that reads, “Only for Ukrainian Refugees.” It is the only place to register to enter the U.S.
About 200 to 300 Ukrainians were being admitted daily at the San Ysidro crossing this week, with hundreds more arriving in Tijuana, according to volunteers who manage the waiting list. There were 973 families or single adults waiting on Tuesday.
U.S officials told volunteers they aim to admit about 550 Ukrainians daily as processing moves to a nearby crossing that is temporarily closed to the public. CBP didn't provide numbers in response to questions about operations and plans, saying only that it has expanded facilities in San Diego to deal with humanitarian cases.
“We realized we had a problem that the government wasn’t going to solve, so we solved it,” said Phil Metzger, pastor of Calvary Church in the San Diego suburb of Chula Vista, where about 75 members host Ukrainian families and another 100 refugees sleep on air mattresses and pews.
Metzger, whose pastoral work has taken him to Ukraine and Hungary, calls the operation "duct tape and glue” but refugees prefer it to overwhelmed European countries, where millions of Ukrainians have settled.
The Biden administration has said it will accept up to 100,000 Ukrainians but Mexico is the only route producing big numbers. Appointments at U.S. consulates in Europe are scarce, and refugee resettlement takes time.
The administration set a refugee resettlement cap of 125,000 in the 12-month period that ends Sept. 30 but accepted only 8,758 by March 31, including 704 Ukrainians. In the previous year, it capped refugee resettlement at 62,500 but took only 11,411, including 803 Ukrainians.
The administration paroled more than 76,000 Afghans through U.S. airports in response to the departure of American troops last year, but nothing similar is afoot for Ukrainians.
Oskana Dugnyk, 36, hesitated to leave her home in Bucha but acquiesced to her husband's wishes before Russian troops invaded the town and left behind streets strewn with corpses. The couple worried about violence in Mexico with three young children but the robust presence of volunteers in Tijuana reassured them and a friend in Ohio agreed to host them.
Also read: Killing of Ukrainian civilians could bring new sanctions
“So far, so good,” Dugnyk said a day after arriving at a Tijuana gymnasium that the city government opened for about 400 Ukrainians to sleep on a basketball court. “We have food. We have a place to stay. We hope everything will be fine.”
Alerted by text message or social media, Ukrainians are summoned to a grassy hill and bus shelter near the border crossing hours before their numbers are called. The city government opened the bus shelter to protect Ukrainians from torrential rain.
Angelina Mykyta, a college student in Kyiv, acknowledged nerves as her number neared. She fled to Warsaw after the invasion but decided to take a chance on the United States because she wanted to settle with a pastor she knows in Kalispell, Montana.
“I think we'll be OK,” she said while waiting to be escorted from the camp of hundreds of Ukrainians to their final stop in Mexico — a small area with a few dozen folding chairs within earshot of U.S. officials. Some refuse to drink at the final stop, fearing they will have to go to the bathroom and miss their turn.
Lulls end when CBP officers approach: "We need a family." “Give me three more.” “Singles, we need singles.” A volunteer ensures orderly movement.
The arrival of Ukrainians comes as the Biden administration prepares for much larger numbers when pandemic-related asylum limits for all nationalities end May 23. Since March 2020, the U.S. has used Title 42 authority, named for a 1944 public health law, to suspend rights to seek asylum under U.S. law and international treaty.
Metzger, the Chula Vista pastor, said his church cannot long continue its 24-hour-a-day pace helping refugees, and suspects U.S. authorities will not adopt what volunteers have done.
“If you make something go smooth, then everybody's going to come,” he said. “We're making it so easy. Eventually I'm sure they'll say, ‘No, we’re done.'”
It’s time to look beyond energy sector: Momen tells Blinken, seeking 'rock-solid' ties
Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen has sought diversified investment from the United States, noting that it is time to look beyond the energy sector while investing in Bangladesh.
“Bangladesh is doing pretty well. But most of the investment (from the US) has been in the energy sector. Maybe it is time to look beyond that,” he said, while noting that the US is Bangladesh's biggest trading partner with the largest accumulated investment in the country.
Before the formal beginning of the bilateral meeting with US Secretary of State Antony J Blinken at the US Department of State, Momen said he is looking forward to a more enhanced and "rock-solid" relationship with the United States of America.
Bangladesh again demanded the withdrawal of sanctions imposed on elite force Rab and some individuals during the bilateral meeting where they discussed bilateral, regional, and global issues.
The US side appreciated the progress made over the last four months and cited the time-consuming process that needs to be followed for the withdrawal of such restrictions.
Foreign Minister Momen also raised the issue of sheltering Rashed Chowdhury, a convicted killer of Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and demanded of his handing him over to Bangladesh.
The two countries discussed what they can do together to strengthen the partnership as Bangladesh sought wider and diversified cooperation from the US.
Marking the 50th anniversary of the establishment of Bangladesh-US diplomatic ties (April 4, 1972), the meeting began at 1:30pm (Washington DC time) and lasted for around 45 minutes.
Lawmaker Mahbubul Alam Hanif, Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen, Secretary (West) Shabbir Ahmad Chowdhury, and Bangladesh Ambassador to the US M Shahidul Islam accompanied Momen at the meeting.
In his remarks before the meeting formally commenced, Secretary Blinken expressed happiness for being able to work together on strengthening the partnership between the United States and Bangladesh.
“We are in fact celebrating 50 years of diplomatic relations. And even as we think back on those 50 years, we’re really looking ahead to the start of the next 50 and the work that we can do together, as I said, to strengthen our partnership,” he said.
The US Secretary of State said Bangladesh has been a leader in rallying other countries to deal with the climate crisis that the planet is facing.
“We deeply appreciate that, and we’re working closely together as well on COVID-19, and we’re proud to have been able to contribute through COVAX some 61 million vaccine doses to Bangladesh,” he said.
In turn, Secretary Blinken said, Bangladesh of course is showing extraordinary humanity and generosity in hosting nearly 1 million Rohingyas who have had to flee persecution in Myanmar.
“We’re grateful for that, and the work that you’ve done as one of the strongest supporters of UN peacekeeping around the world, and many other things as well. But we’ll have an opportunity today to discuss the work we’re doing together bilaterally in the region and indeed even globally,” he said.
In his opening remarks, Momen also thanked his US counterpart for committing 61 million of the vaccines - the highest among all the countries. “I think Bangladesh is the number one in terms of receiving the vaccine.”
In addition, he said, the 31 million for the recent economic assistance. “And I also thank you because you have declared the genocide in Myanmar, and we’re so happy you did. I hope there will be some repatriation of these persecuted people,” said the Foreign Minister.
Momen mentioned that they received a letter from President Biden and termed it an excellent letter. “It helps what we want to do. It talks about the last 50 years; we have done a remarkable achievement.”
The Foreign Minister said the U.S. has always been a friend of Bangladesh, during bad times and good times. “And we look forward to a bright future, and that’s why I’m here.”
Over the last 50 years, Momen said, Bangladesh really achieved many – a lot of achievements. "Now we have a vibrant economy, a land of opportunity. And the U.S. has been a great partner and friend."
Adding a personal note, he said he was thankful to the USA for providing him with a job and home when he was "homeless, jobless, and stateless."
US, EU announce new partnership to undercut Russian energy
The United States and European Union on Friday announced a new partnership to reduce the continent’s reliance on Russian energy, a step top officials characterized as the start of a years-long initiative to further isolate Moscow after its invasion of Ukraine.
U.S. President Joe Biden asserted that Russian President Vladimir Putin uses energy to “coerce and manipulate his neighbors” and uses the profits from its sale to “drive his war machine.”
Biden said the partnership he announced jointly with a top European Union official will turn that dynamic on its head by reducing Europe’s dependence on Russian energy sources, as well reducing the continent’s demand for gas overall.
The president said such a step is not “only the right thing to do from a moral standpoint” but “it’s going to put us on a stronger strategic footing.”
Under the plan, the U.S. and other nations will increase liquified natural gas exports to Europe by 15 billion cubic meters this year, though U.S. officials were unable to say exactly which countries will provide the extra energy this year. Even larger shipments would be delivered in the future.
Read: UN to vote on blaming Russia for Ukraine humanitarian crisis
At the same time, they will try to keep their climate goals on track by powering gas infrastructure with clean energy and reducing methane leaks that can worsen global warming.
Although the initiative will likely require new facilities for importing liquified natural gas, the partnership is also geared toward reducing reliance on fossil fuels in the long run through energy efficiency and alternative sources of energy, according to the White House.
Ursula von der Leyen, head of the EU’s executive arm, said it is important for Europe to shift away from Russia and toward energy suppliers that are trustworthy, friendly and reliable.
“We aim to reduce this dependence on Russian fossil fuels and get rid of it,” she said.
Russian energy is a key source of income and political leverage for Moscow. Almost 40% of the European Union’s natural gas comes from Russia to heat homes, generate electricity and power industry.
Biden was leaving Brussels after the announcement and heading to Rzeszów in Poland, where U.S. troops are based roughly an hour’s drive from the Ukrainian border.
He will be briefed on the humanitarian response to the refugees streaming out of Ukraine and those still suffering inside the country. He also will meet with U.S. service members from the 82nd Airborne Division, who serve alongside Polish troops.
Biden is then expected to fly to Warsaw for talks Saturday with Polish President Andrzej Duda and an address to the Polish people before he departs for Washington.
While in Brussels, Biden participated in a trio of summits hosted by NATO, the Group of Seven industrialized nations and the European Union, all on Thursday. The extraordinary series of meetings reflects heightened concerns about the war in Ukraine, which has entered its second month.
Read: Ukraine president pleads for worldwide show of support
Although Ukraine has resisted the Russian invasion much more successfully than initially expected, the conflict has become a grueling and bloody affair, with thousands of casualties on each side and millions of refugees fleeing the country.
Western leaders are also concerned that Russian President Vladimir Putin could use chemical or even nuclear weapons to regain momentum in the war.
Getting more liquefied natural gas to Europe could be difficult, even though the U.S. has been dramatically increasing its exports in recent years. Many export facilities are already operating at capacity, and most new terminals are still only in the planning stages.
Most U.S. shipments already go to Europe, according to the Center for Liquefied Natural Gas, an industry lobbying group. Although much of the supply is already contracted out to buyers, there are still opportunities to shift its destination.
US says Myanmar repression of Muslim Rohingya is genocide
Violent repression of the largely Muslim Rohingya population in Myanmar amounts to genocide, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said Monday, a declaration intended to both generate international pressure and lay the groundwork for potential legal action.
Authorities made the determination based on confirmed accounts of mass atrocities on civilians by Myanmar's military in a widespread and systematic campaign against the ethnic minority, Blinken said in a speech at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum.
It is the eighth time since the Holocaust that the U.S. has concluded a genocide has occurred. The secretary of state noted the importance of calling attention to inhumanity even as horrific attacks occur elsewhere in the world, including Ukraine.
“Yes, we stand with the people of Ukraine," he said. "And we must also stand with people who are suffering atrocities in other places.”
The government of Myanmar, also known as Burma, is already under multiple layers of U.S. sanctions since a military coup ousted the democratically elected government in February 2021. Thousands of civilians throughout the country have been killed and imprisoned as part of ongoing repression of anyone opposed to the ruling junta.
The determination that a genocide has occurred could lead other nations to increase pressure on the government, which is already facing accusations of genocide at the International Court of Justice in The Hague.
“As we lay the foundation for future accountability, we’re also working to stop the military’s ongoing atrocities, and support the people of Burma as they strive to put the country back on the path to democracy,” Blinken said.
More than 700,000 Rohingya Muslims have fled from Buddhist-majority Myanmar to refugee camps in Bangladesh since August 2017, when Myanmar's military launched an operation aimed at clearing them from the country following attacks by a rebel group.
The status of the plight of the Rohingya had been under extended review by U.S. government legal experts since the Trump administration, given potential legal ramifications of such a finding. The delay in the determination had drawn criticism from both inside and outside the government, which has been accused through successive administrations of being too slow in making such decisions on this and in other cases, most notable in Sudan’s Darfur region in the early 2000s.
Read: Rohingya case: Bangladesh assures continued support for The Gambia
Human rights groups and members of Congress welcomed the announcement despite the delay in a determination that has already been made by other countries, including Canada, France and Turkey.
“The U.S. determination of the crime of genocide against us is a momentous moment and must lead to concrete action to hold the Burmese military accountable for their crimes,” said Tun Khin, president of the Burmese Rohingya Organisation UK.
Human Rights Watch said the U.S. and other governments should seek justice for crimes carried out by the military and impose stronger sanctions against its leadership.
“The U.S. government should couple its condemnations of Myanmar’s military with action,” said John Sifton, the group’s Asia advocacy director. “For too long, the U.S. and other countries have allowed Myanmar’s generals to commit atrocities with few real consequences.”
A 2018 State Department report documented instances of Myanmar's military razing villages and carrying out rapes, tortures and mass killings of civilians since at least 2016. Blinken said evidence showed the violence wasn't isolated, but part of a systematic program that amounts to crimes against humanity.
Read:Roving with Rohingyas: How feminine hearts can make a difference, from scare to care
“The evidence also points to a clear intent behind these mass atrocities, the intent to destroy Rohingya, in whole or in part, through killings, rape, and torture,” he said.
Previous determinations of genocide by the U.S. include campaigns against Uyghurs and other largely Muslim minorities in China as well as in Bosnia, Rwanda, Iraq and Darfur.
'Economic Framework' of IPS to be released soon; draft on GSOMIA passed
Bangladesh has underscored the need for having an economic component in the Indo-Pacific Strategy (IPS), in response to which the US side informed that "Economic Framework" of the IPS would be released soon.
During the Partnership Dialogue held at State guesthouse Padma on Sunday, the two governments reaffirmed their commitment to enduring partnership, highlighting close cooperation on security, development, humanitarian assistance, and counterterrorism.
The two governments agreed to continue to cooperate closely to advance a shared vision of a free, open, inclusive, peaceful, and secure Indo-Pacific region.
Bangladesh and the US also passed a “draft” on the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA) which is seen as a "gateway" to do more on the security front.
"Today, we passed a draft agreement and we are very confident that we will be able to get the issue settled so that we can do more on the security side together," US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland told reporters during a joint media briefing.
The United States is currently working with the Government of Bangladesh to conclude certain foundational defence agreements (GSOMIA and ACSA), which are "essential" to enabling a closer defence relationship, expanding opportunities for defence trade, information sharing, and military-to-military cooperation between our two countries.
The GSOMIA is a foundational government-to-government bilateral agreement that will permit greater collaboration and sharing of classified military information in the form of intelligence and classified information U.S. defence equipment.
GSOMIA is a reciprocal, legally binding agreement that ensures governments understand and commit to protecting classified military information at an equivalent level of security, according to US documents.
It does not obligate or commit governments to share classified information or material, it only ensures equivalent protection of the information if shared.
Responding to a question, Nuland said there are economic, security and technology elements in the IPS and they would love to see Bangladesh be involved in much of it (IPS).
Discussion on the issue of repatriation of forcibly displaced Rohingyas also took place.
Bangladesh shared its priority on the repatriation of the displaced Rohingyas as soon as possible.
Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen who led the Bangladesh side suggested that the recently concluded MoU between Bangladesh and UNHCR on Bhasan Char should pave the way for US humanitarian assistance in Bhasan Char.
Nuland assured of the US’s continued political and humanitarian support for the Rohingya crisis.
The FS also called upon the US side to consider restoring GSP facilities for Bangladeshi RMG exports and also requested US support for the trade facilitation proposals for graduating LDCs in the auspices of the WTO.
Dhaka-Washington "Partnership Dialogue” Sunday; Under Secretary Nuland in city
Under Secretary for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland, the third-ranked official at the US Department of State, arrived here on Saturday afternoon to attend “Partnership Dialogue” with Bangladesh set for Sunday.
Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen who will lead the Bangladesh delegation at the 8th dialogue, welcomed Victoria Nuland at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport at 05:10pm, said an official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
Nuland will meet Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen during her visit.
She is here as part of her tri-nation visit to South Asia as she will be visiting India and Sri Lanka where she sees US' partnerships are vital to strengthening peace, prosperity, and security throughout the Indo-Pacific region.
Also read: US Under Secretary Nuland due Saturday to deepen ties with Bangladesh
During her March 19-23 visit to Bangladesh, India, and Sri Lanka with an interagency delegation, Nuland will underscore U.S. commitment to, and cooperation with, Indo-Pacific partners, according to the US Department of State.
Dhaka set to host first meeting of US-BD officials, post-sanctions
The United States sees the upcoming "Partnership Dialogue" with Bangladesh as an opportunity to expand the "robust relationship" between the two countries, according to an official posted at the US Embassy in Dhaka. Both sides emphasise the multi-faceted nature of the relationship cannot be undermined by any single issue.
The entire gamut of relations between the two countries - security cooperation, trade, labour rights, investment opportunities, human rights, governance, global threats including climate change, regional issues including a free and open Indo-Pacific region - are all expected to fall within the ambit of the dialogue, to be held in Dhaka on March 20.
"In the dialogue we will discuss opportunities to expand a robust relationship, ways we can further enhance close ties on a range of areas of cooperation," said the US Embassy official in Dhaka on Tuesday.
While briefing a small group of journalists, he said Bangladesh-US ties go beyond the government-to-government sphere, with the people to-people contacts and commercial relationships remaining active and growing.
READ: Bangladesh, US keen to further strengthen ties with greater engagements
US Department of State's Under Secretary of Political Affairs Victoria Nuland is scheduled to arrive Dhaka on March 19 to lead the US delegation for the 8th bilateral "Partnership Dialogue" between the two countries.
Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen will lead the Bangladesh delegation.
In this fiftieth year of diplomatic relations, Washington seeks to "deepen a strong and multi-faceted relationship" built on mutual respect and shared interests with Bangladesh, said the US Embassy official.
During this visit, Under Secretary Nuland, whose rank makes her the third-most senior official at the State Department, will have the opportunity to make people-to-people and business connections.
"We have a long history of cooperation between our two countries," said the official at the US Embassy.
The United States has been a consistent partner in the success stories of Bangladesh, and this dialogue, and others that follow this year, will demonstrate their willingness to remain so in the future.
Earlier, Foreign Secretary Masud Bin Momen said the relations between Bangladesh and the United States have many factors and determinants and the relations will be enhanced and deepened through a number of dialogues, visits back-and-forth, and track-2 engagements in the coming months.
"To this end, we are aiming at fostering a closer understanding with the US,” he said recently, adding that Bangladesh fully intends to “enhance and deepen” its ties with the US.
Meanwhile, a rung or two above the dialogue, Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen is scheduled to have a bilateral meeting (in-person) with his US counterpart, Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in Washington on April 4.
Dhaka, Washington ties “broad, dynamic”: Ambassador Haas
Newly appointed US Ambassador to Bangladesh Peter Haas on Tuesday said Bangladesh is an important US partner and the bilateral relationship is "broad and dynamic".
"Our cooperation on economic issues, development, security, and climate change demonstrates the range of our strong partnership and future potential," he said after presenting his credentials to President Abdul Hamid.
Beyond the work of government, the United States and Bangladesh are closely linked through our people-to-people ties, he said.
"Together, we have delivered greater prosperity to both our peoples while working to make the Indo-Pacific region more open, more secure, and more prosperous," said the US envoy.
Ambassador Haas said this year marks 50 years of friendship between our two countries.
Read: New US Ambassador Peter Haas arrives in Dhaka