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Mr. Jorgen Lissner,
Resident Co-ordinator of the United Nations in
Bangladesh,
Mr. Rajmohan Gandhi,
former Member of the Rajya Sabha,
Excellencies, Hon.
Members of the Bangladesh Parliament, dear friends,
representatives of the Civil Society, Academic
Institutions and the media,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
I am honoured to
preside over this Round Table Discussion organised by
the Institute of Parliamentary Studies in Bangladesh. I
would like to thank especially those who have helped to
turn the concept of the Institute into a reality, as
such an independent forum for intellectual debate and
research has become, nowadays, an indispensable tool for
politicians, and especially for parliamentarians. I
would like, in the forthcoming years, to see it grow and
expand its boundaries by responding to the demands for
information of the civil society, the media, the
academia and researchers, and the public at large. I am
delighted to see that it is becoming a forum for
encounters between parliamentarians, the media, and the
citizens of Bangladesh.
The Institute of
Parliamentary Studies has a vocation to act as a
crossroads between persons who, in one way or another,
are interested in Parliamentary Democracy. It is, of
course, a forum for exchange of ideas between Hon.
Members of the Bangladesh Parliament and public
representatives from other houses of Parliament. It is
also a place where we hope that representatives of the
Bangladeshi civil society and professionals from the
media will be able to interact regularly with
parliamentarians from home and abroad. Last week, we
held here, in this same room, a seminar between
Australian and Bangladeshi Members of Parliament.
Tonight, we will have the opportunity to debate with a
former parliamentarian from the Upper House of India,
who has honoured us with his visit and has kindly
accepted to inaugurate the series of Round Table
Discussions of the IPS.
Meanwhile, the
Bangladesh Parliament has been initiating the discussion
of the Bill that will institutionalise the IPS and
establish it as an independent body. We are proud to see
the progress of this piece of legislation, and hope to
see the House enacting it soon. The Bill will bring with
it the formal commencement of the operations of the
Institute, with a regulatory framework passed by the
Parliament.
But we could not sit
idle awaiting the Bill to be formally enacted, and
decided a year ago, with the support of the UNDP, to
include all the initial activities of the IPS under the
umbrella of the ongoing project "Strengthening
Parliamentary Democracy". The Institute will
inherit, at the formal commencement of its tenure, these
fully equipped premises, a database of national experts,
an ongoing training programme that has already served
over fifty Members and two hundred Parliament
Secretariat Officials, a series of specialised
publications and monographs on parliamentary matters and
a set of activities such as the one we are participating
in tonight. Groundwork has been done, allowing us to
believe that the Institute will have a bright future and
be an effective tool in promoting a democratic culture
in Bangladesh.
The Institute decided
that it would select carefully the personalities who
would participate in its activities, according to the
high profile and prestige that is to be expected from
such an institution. It is my privilege to present Mr.
Rajmohan Gandhi as the first of the distinguished
parliamentarians and academicians who will be speaking
in the next years from this dais. A double privilege,
because Mr. Gandhi couples in his career both facets
that I just mentioned: the parliamentary experience and
the academic profession.
Former Member of the
Rajya Sabha, historian, biographer, commentator,
professor, laureate of a dozen amongst the most
prestigious universities of the world, prolific writer
and passionate pacifist, Mr. Gandhi has been a permanent
inspiration for us. It is the second time, in a short
period of time, that we have the pleasure of hearing him
speak on a subject that has gained increasing importance
in both the daily work of Parliaments and the agenda of
the international community.
We had the opportunity
to learn from Mr. Gandhi last year, when he represented
the Civil Society Organisations at the Asian
Parliamentarians Conference for Peace and Cooperation,
held in Dhaka in September 1999. He then declared
himself "convinced that any effective process of
prevention and resolution of violent conflicts must take
into account the root causes of these conflicts and
their social and economic dimensions". When
identifying the major actors in such a conflict
prevention and resolution process, he named "the
governments, people’s representatives as well as civil
society organisations, recommending a multi-disciplinary
approach for peace-building, based on active
participation of, and cooperation among, government,
parliamentarians, NGOs, private sector, media, and
others in civil society". Mr. Gandhi defined such
an approach as "the use of multi-track diplomacy
for establishment of favourable conditions towards
prevention and resolution of violent conflicts".
Mr. Rajmohan Gandhi
will elaborate on the topic "Parliamentary
Diplomacy in International Relations", and I am
sure that the idea of the "multi-track
diplomacy" will be present in his thoughts and in
his words. In my capacities as a diplomat, Foreign
Secretary and Foreign Minister, and now as the Speaker
of the House, I have always believed that parliamentary
diplomacy has much to offer to the diplomatic efforts of
governments, and could fruitfully complete such efforts
at the multilateral and bilateral levels. Perhaps the
voice of the developing world, as it enters into the
arena of the international community, will be better
heard if democratic parliaments add a wealth of nuances,
pluralism and diversity to the more homogeneous stands
of governments. Indeed, parliamentary diplomacy has a
greater say than ever before in the international
relations of this new Millennium. Our learned keynote
speaker for tonight will unveil whether such optimism
is, in his view, justified.
I thank you very much
for your kind attention and for attending this function
at the
. I would now like to invite Mr. Rajmohan
Gandhi to take the floor and to elaborate on this topic.
Mr. Rajmohan Gandhi.
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