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Donors concerned over worsening governance

Washington meet points at law and order, political violence including bombings and climate of impunity

STAFF CORRESPONDENT
Country's development partners, rounding off a unique meeting in Washington yesterday, issued a joint statement expressing concern at the deterioration of governance situation in Bangladesh.
"The participants, by consensus, expressed serious concern at the deterioration of governance situation in Bangladesh, especially the situation of law and order, political violence including recent bombings, and the climate of impunity," reads the statement issued after the meet
held on February 23 and 24. The US embassy in Dhaka faxed a copy of the statement to the local press yesterday.
The statement further reads, "Partners were keenly aware that these are problems that have plagued Bangladesh over many years. The international partners renewed their offer to provide their full support to help the government meet its commitments to improve the situation, as well as those identified in the Poverty Reduction Strategy."
However, the meeting recognised the good progress
Bangladesh has made over the last 15 years towards meeting the Millennium Development Goals.
According to the statement, the development partners of Bangladesh met in Washington with the aim to agree how to best assist Bangladesh in addressing its fundamental and increasing governance challenges.
They recognised the vital importance of free and fair elections for the future development of the country and stressed the importance of preventing the electoral preparations from being disrupted by politi-
cal violence and hartals.
Senior staffs of The World Bank (WB), Asian Development Bank (ADB), European Commission (EC), UNDP and of the governments of Canada, Denmark, Japan, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, United Kingdom and United States participated in the meeting at Washington's Watergate Hotel. The country offices of the multilateral lending agencies presented before the meeting overviews of the overall situation prevailing in Bangladesh.
SEE PAGE 11 COL 6 Donors concerned
FROM PAGE 1
The European Union, the WB and the US State Department jointly organised the meet without any representation of the Bangladesh government, which gave rise to various questions in Dhaka.
The participants conveyed the meeting's agreed conclusions to the Bangladesh government and said they were looking forward to continuing political and development discussions with the government.