Sunday, August 8, 2010

Maldives keen in import Bangladeshi sands

The Maldives is keen to import quality sands from Bangladesh to meet the growing demands of the major construction material in the island country, Maldivian High Commissioner in Dhaka said as he called on Home Minister Sahara Khatun here.

A home ministry spokesman said Maldives envoy Ahmed Sareer told the minister that their country needed 400,000 tonnes of sands every year and three-fourths of the volume were currently being imported from India.

"The quality of the Bangladeshi river sands is better than that of India and we are interested to import sands from this country," the spokesman quoted the ambassador as saying.

He said the envoy also told the minister that a process was underway in Male to legalise the illegal Bangladeshi workers in Maldives engaged in construction and other sectors.

Some 40,000 Bangladeshis were now engaged in different jobs in the island country and Sareer said they enjoyed goodwill for their handworks and sincerity.

The spokesman said Sareer reiterated his government's stance to work together with Bangladesh in the international climate negotiations as both the countries were exposed to worst onslaughts of the global climatic phenomenon.

The minister, he said, urged Maldives to take more Bangladeshi workers.

Acting home secretary Mohammad Yunusur Rahman, additional secretary Iqbal Khan Chowdhury and joint secretary (political) Dr Kamaluddin Ahmed were present during the meeting.

Source: http://nation.ittefaq.com

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