Participants of the People’s SAARC here in Kathmandu have stressed the need to address the pressing needs of the people of the region and translate the commitments of member states into action.

At a programme organised in the capital on Sunday to publicise the Kathmandu Declaration at the end of the three-day long People’s SAARC, leaders from SAARC countries said the SAARC had not been able to address the real needs of the people of the region.

Chief guest of the programme, CPN (UML) general secretary Madhav Kumar Nepal said the SAARC had failed to deal with the issues of the marginalised and poor people and that the SAARC nations were acting like pawns in the hands of western countries. Poverty is the main area the SAARC members need to work on, he said.

Pakistani Member of Parliament (MP) Manjur Ahmed urged the governments in region to cut down military expenditure and invest more on welfare and benefits of the poor and hungry people of South Asia. It is an irony that while largest number of poor people in the world live in South Asia the governments in the region have been increasing budgets on the military and nuclear weapons, he added.

Indian Dalit leader Dr. Uma Kanta was of the view that the people’s SAARC was the demand of time to raise the voice of the suppressed, marginalised and disadvantaged people of the region whose voice have never been heard in SAARC forums.

Bhutanese refugee leader Dr. D. N. S. Dhakal said the Bhutanese refugee issue should be a major agenda of the upcoming SAARC summit.

Other leaders addressing the function also emphasised the need for implementation of the SAARC commitments for poverty eradication and establishment of poverty alleviation fund to meet the millennium development goals set by the UN.

The three-day conference of the SAARC MPs and political leaders held in Kathmandu from March 23 adopted its first declaration vowing to work for people-based democratic system of governance to develop and strengthen good governance from the grassroots to national and regional levels.

The Kathmandu Declaration states that it is about time to refuse the western capitalistic dominance.

Of the many demands put forward, the conference called for strengthening and institutionalising democracy, combat religious, ethnic and gender based violence, guarantee sovereign rights of the people for food, solve the problems of refugees and internally displaced people, extend support to the struggle of the Bhutanese refugees, promote free media, downsize the defence budget, declare 2007-2017 as SAARC Dalit decade, guarantee 50 reservation to women in all aspects of governance and end of all forms of indentured labour in the region.

Current MPs, former MPs and political leaders from Nepal, Bhutan, Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka and Pakistan participated in the People’s SAARC conference.