Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina leaves Dhaka tomorrow on a 15-day official tour to Japan, the US and the UK, aimed at strengthening ties with the country's major development partners as it aspires to graduate out of LDC by 2026.
During the visit to Japan, Bangladesh may sign memorandums of cooperation (MoCs) on eight fields, including defence and security, to take the bilateral relationship to strategic level from the current comprehensive relations.
Other MoCs likely to be signed include agriculture, metro rail, industrial upgradation, ship recycling, customs matters, intellectual property, defence cooperation, ICT, and cyber security, said Foreign Minister AK Abdul Momen at a curtain raiser at the foreign ministry today.
"So, this visit will create more important scope for discussion on elevating the relationship to strategic level," he told journalists.
Bangladesh expects to expand economic and trade cooperation through a new framework of relationship, Momen said.
Japan is implementing some of the mega projects in Bangladesh, including Matarbar Deep Sea Port, Araihazar Special Economic Zone, third terminal of Hazrat Shahjalal International Airport, and Dhaka Metro Rail. It also wants to create an industrial hub in Bangladesh and develop connectivity to northeastern India.
Bangladesh wants to take the connectivity beyond India's northeast to Bhutan and Nepal, to improve regional connectivity.
Asked why defence cooperation with Japan was necessary, Momen said protection of Bangladesh's maritime is important. There are reports of illegal fishing in the Bay of Bengal and Japan expressed willingness to support Bangladesh.
State Minister for Foreign Affairs Shahriar Alam said the defence cooperation is purely a bilateral one and no third element is involved, when asked if it has any regional or global implications.
"Its purpose is to promote and strengthen cooperation in the fields of defence dialogue, visit, courses, technology transfer…Bangladesh's capacity has developed. We want to strengthen our defence force," Alam added.
The PM, who is scheduled to leave Dhaka at 7:45am by a special flight of Biman Bangladesh Airlines, will pay a courtesy call on Emperor of Japan Naruhito on April 26. She will hold a bilateral meeting with her Japanese counterpart, Fumio Kishida, followed by a dinner.
She is scheduled to attend an investment summit and a community reception in Tokyo, while also hand over the "Friends of Liberation War Honour" to four Japanese nationals for their contribution to Bangladesh's Liberation War in 1971.
The PM will leave Tokyo on April 28 and reach Washington the next day to attend an event marking a 50-year partnership between Bangladesh and the World Bank on May 1.
Senior officials of the US-Bangladesh Business Council, US Chamber of Commerce will hold meeting with her. Besides, PM will participate in a high-level executive roundtable of the US Bangladesh Business Council at the invitation of Council President Nisha Desai Biswal.
Momen said there will not be any bilateral meeting between Hasina and any high-level US official.
"We did not try for it as only recently I held a meeting with the US secretary of state," he said.
Hasina will leave Washington for London on May 4 to attend the coronation of Charles III and his wife, Camilla, as king and queen of the UK and the other Commonwealth realms.
She will leave London for Dhaka on May 8.
