The foreign relations ensemble in South Asia has, for long, been dominated by the India-Pakistan scenario.Of late, however, a slanging match between India and Bangladesh over the terrorist infrastructure in thelatter has cornered significant media space. Much of this was, again, in evidence during the Fifth HomeSecretary-level biennial talks held in Dhaka on September 16-17, 2004.
The Indian delegation, led by Home Secretary Dhirendra Singh, presented a detailed list and some specificinformation relating to some 195 camps of Indian insurgents that it claimed were in Bangladesh, to Bangladeshidelegates. Unsurprisingly, Dhaka denied knowledge of any such camp but said it would 'look further into thematter'. In a tit-for-tat ploy, Dhaka sought 'immediate Indian action' against anti-Bangladesh elementscurrently alleged to be on Indian soil. In reply, India stressed the need for an extradition treaty tofacilitate the return of any such anti-Bangladeshi elements.
At the end of the talks, Bangladesh and India agreed to co-ordinate patrols in their own territories.Bangladesh also declared its readiness to sign an agreement to enhance co-operation in security issues, ifrequired, and also agreed to consider India's proposal for an extradition treaty. Bangladesh has agreed torespond to this proposal at a meeting between the two countries likely to be held in January or early February2004. India, on its part, proposed a three-point package proposal for Dhaka to notify India on the 1974 LandBoundary Agreement and agreed to work towards a more concrete solution to the problem after receiving Dhaka'sresponse to the package.
India shares a 4,095-kilometer border with Bangladesh, its longest land boundary with any of its neighbours.The States of Tripura, Meghalaya, Mizoram and Assam in India's Northeast account for 1,879 kilometers, and theeastern state of West Bengal has a border running 2,216 kilometers along Bangladesh. An area of 6.5 kilometersof this extended frontier is yet to be demarcated and two Joint Boundary Working Groups have been set up tocomplete the boundary demarcation.