Bangladesh, Myanmar agree to demarcate maritime boundary

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CHITTAGONG, Jan 9 (UNB): Bangladesh and Myanmar Saturday agreed to demarcate the maritime boundary of the two countries through a coordinated policy having the "principle of equity' and 'equidistance system'.
Both the countries reached the consensus to formulate the coordinated policy on the last day of a two-day high-level meeting at Hotel Agrabad here.
Additional Foreign Secretary Rear Admiral (retd) M Khorshed Alam briefed reporters about it after the meeting.
Khorshed Alam, who led the Bangladesh side at the meeting, said the two countries would hold another meeting in Myanmar before the month of April to formulate the coordinated policy. He, however, said the talks ended fruitfully. Deputy Foreign Minister of Myanmar Yu Maung Myint led the Myanmar side.
Replying to a question, he said the nature of the coordinated system would be fixed through discussions. "It's a technical matter. We've agreed to continue talks," he said.
Myanmar Ambassador to Bangladesh U Phae Than Oo also termed the discussion fruitful and said it would continue.
During Friday's talks, Bangladesh and Myanmar placed their respective proposals on demarcation of the maritime boundary, as they opened the talks on a positive note to resolve the dispute over the mineral-rich waters of the Bay of Bengal.
On the first day of the two-day meeting, Bangladesh proposed fix -ing the maritime boundary following the 'Principle of Equity' while Myanmar recommended per-line-based equidistance system.
The dispute was created over the maritime boundary between the two neighbouring countries as Bangladesh protested Myanmar's move for lifting mineral resources from a block in the deep sea during the last caretaker government.
Later, Bangladesh formally raised the issue at the Arbitration Tribunal of the United Nations in October, 2009 for a solution.
On the other hand, neither Bangladesh nor India could extract mineral resources from gas-and-oil blocks in the deep sea, as both the countries claimed the blocks as theirs, said a Foreign Ministry source from the meeting.
The sources said Myanmar and India have claimed 18 out of 27 blocks of Bangladesh in the deep sea for long.
After 22 years, Bangladesh and Myanmar sat in a meeting in 2008 to demarcate the maritime boundary, but the talks ended inconclusively.