Minister for Foreign Affairs Narendra Bikram Shah left for Sri Lanka Wednesday to attend the ministerial meeting of the BIMST-EC being held on December 20.

BIMT-EC was formed in 1997 with the objective of enhancing economic cooperation among its member states-Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

The objective of BIMST-EC is to create an enabling environment for rapid economic development in the sub-region through identification and implementation of specific projects in the core areas of trade and investment, transportation and communications, energy, technology, tourism and fisheries.

Nepal has been attending the BIMST-EC meetings as an observer since 1998. The forthcoming Colombo meeting will hold discussions on Nepal’s full-fledged membership in this regional economic grouping of countries belonging to South Asia and South-East Asia.

Nepal believes that with the support of all member states it will assume BIMST-EC full- fledged membership from next year, a Foreign Ministry press release said.