Maldives warmly welcomes Mahinda for 17th SAARC Summit

President Mahinda Rajapaksa and the Sri Lankan delegation attending the 17th SAARC Summit was warmly welcomed by the Maldivian President Mohamed Nasheed and the First Lady Laila Ali Abdulla and the Foreign Minister Ahmed Naseem on arrival in Male yesterday.

The Sri Lankan High Commissioner in Maldives Dickson Dela and the High Commission officials were also present. The Maldivian government has made all arrangements to hold the 17th SAARC Head of States Summit in a very grand scale.

The Sri Lankan delegation included the First Lady Madam Shiranthi Rajapaksa, the Minister of Power and Energy Champika Ranawaka, Parliamentarians Sajin Vas Gunawardene, A.H.M.Azwer, and Kamala Ranatunge and the President’s Secretary Lalith Weeratunge.

The 17th summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation which was started in 1985 will be held at the Maldivian southern town of Addu, at the Hithadhoo Conference Centre. The theme of the summit, which will be held on 10 and 11 November, will be ‘Building Bridges.’ The Addu town which is 478 kilometers south of capital Male acquires a prominent place similar to Maale. The Atoll of Addu has seven islands. Population wise Addu is second only to Maale and the main activities in the Atoll are tourism and fisheries.

This is the first time a prominent conference is being held in Addu.

The SAARC region consists of one fifth of the world population and follows about 10 religions and speaks about 100 languages. Afghanistan, India, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Maldives, Bangladesh, Bhutan and Nepal are the member countries of the SAARC.

In conjunction with the SAARC summit and in strengthening the bilateral relations between Sri Lanka and Maldives laying of carpets for about one and half kilometers of the access route to the summit hall in Addu was carried out under the sponsorship of Sri Lanka.

The Special Task Force of Sri Lankan Army is in charge of the security and special activities of the summit.

Sri Lanka is also contributing for a major part of the transport facilities being provided for the representatives attending the Summit.