Foreign Secretary Shamser Mobin Chowdhury yesterday said the Dhaka-Agartala bus service is likely to start this month.

"Infrastructure work including road repairing, if necessary, would be done and we're confident that the bus service would start this month," he told reporters.

He said the communications ministers of India and Bangladesh will take steps for commissioning of the bus service already approved by the cabinet

Asked if Dhaka would lodge any protest against India's reported plan to link rivers in the upstream to supply water to dry Indian regions, the foreign secretary said the government is gathering all informa

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tion from different sources before filing any protest.

Besides, Shamser said he had discussed the matter with the water resources secretary.

Replying to another question, he said Bangladesh has not relinquished its claim of ownership on the disputed south Talpatty island in the Bay.

About the demarcation of maritime boundary with India, the foreign secretary said the issue would be settled under the UN convention on the law of the seas. Any individual country cannot do it unilaterally.

It is a complex law and complex process and it would take time, the secretary said, adding that a maritime cell in the foreign ministry is working on it.

He reiterated Dhaka's willingness to join post-war reconstruction in Iraq.

"Our willingness to participate in the reconstruction remains as strong as it was... Our ambassador is now in Baghdad. We'll join when we will get the request," he told reporters.

Recently, the US government invited some 30 countries to join the post-war reconstruction in Iraq. Bangladesh is, however, not on that list.

On the question of sending troops to Iraq as earlier desired by the United States, Shamser said Dhaka wants to send them as peacekeepers under the UN umbrella.

About sending troops to Liberia, he said Dhaka is ready to dispatch them to Monrovia as per UN Security Council resolution. The deployment would start in the first week of October, but details of it would have to be worked out, he added.

The foreign secretary said Bangladesh is keen to see the full implementation of the 1974 IndoBangladesh Land Boundary Agreement.

He made the remark in response to a query about unfettered access of Bangladeshi citizens to the country's two enclaves of Dahagram and Angorpota across India through Tinbigha corridor.

"We're keen to see the implementation of all provisions of the agreement," he said, adding that issues like demarcation of some 6.5

kilometres of boundary and exchange of the enclaves and "adversely possessed" lands need to be resolved.

The issue was discussed at the last foreign secretary level meeting in Dhaka and a Joint Working Group is working to complete the task, he said.

The foreign secretary said Islamabad appeared to be more agreeable to resolve the longstanding issues of repatriation of the stranded Pakistanis and apportionment of pre-independence assets.

Shamser, who had talks with the Pakistani leaders during last month's foreign secretary level meeting in Islamabad, said he had raised these issues and sought their early resolution.

Asked about the Free Trade Agreement (FTA), the foreign secretary said Bangladesh has agreed in principle to discuss the FTA with Pakistan.