Commonwealth Secy Gen Sharma in city

Commonwealth Secretary-General Kamalesh Sharma arrived here on Friday night on a three-day visit, said a senior Foreign Ministry official. Acting Foreign Secretary and Secretary at the Maritime Affairs Unit Rear Admiral (retd) M Khurshed Alam received him at Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport at 10:40pm.
Sharma, who is leading a three member delegation, will brief the Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina on the forthcoming Commonwealth Heads of Governments Meeting (CHOGM) to be held in Malta between November 27-29 November this year and Commonwealth Bangladesh Cooperation, said the official.
The meeting with the Prime Minister will be held at Ganobhaban at 5pm in which Sharma will invite her to attend the CHOGM. He will meet Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali in the morning of Saturday and discuss the fourteenth Meeting of Commonwealth Foreign Affairs Ministers (CFAMM) to be held in New York on September 24. Foreign Minister AH Mahmood Ali is likely to attend the CFAMM as he is scheduled to leave here for New York on September 23 to attend the 70th session of the UN General assembly (UNGA).
The Foreign Minister will host dinner in honour of the Commonwealth Secretary General on Saturday. The meeting between them will be held in the morning on the same day.
The Commonwealth Foreign Ministers will meet in New York as part of their fourteenth meeting to discuss a range of Commonwealth priorities. The CFAMM will also provide the opportunity to bring Foreign Ministers the update on the preparations being made for CHOGM 2015. Sharma became Commonwealth Secretary-General on April 1, 2008 having been appointed to the post by Commonwealth Heads of Government at their meeting in Kampala, Uganda in November 2007. He joined the Indian Foreign Service in 1965, and served at ambassadorial level in five missions, including as India’s High Commissioner to the United Kingdom, where he was closely involved in Commonwealth affairs.
Sharma was India’s Ambassador and Permanent Representative to the United Nations in Geneva 1988-1990, and acted as the spokesperson for developing countries in the UN Conference on Trade and Development (Unctad) during the Uruguay Round of multilateral trade talks, according to a news agency.
- biplab