Bangladesh has become party to the ESCAP sponsored Asian Highway agreement. This was notified from the ESCAP headquarters in Bangkok. The ESCAP sponsored route kept Tamabil as the entry point and Benapole and Banglabandh as the exit points.()

Earlier Bangladesh was not a party to the ESCAP-sponsored Asian Highway agreement because of the controversy revolving round the route.

The ESCAP sponsored route would help meet the Indian demand for transit from Bangladesh and obliterate the historical Grand Trunk Road built during the Shershah regime to connect the East Asian countries from Gumdung of Cox''s Bazar.

Except the Awami League government no other governments accepted the ESCAP sponsored Asian Highway routes. The last four-party alliance government withheld the ratification of the ESCAP prepared agreement and pressed hard to include the Chittagong-Myanmar route as one of the international routes of the Asian Highway.

But on every occasion Bangladesh was told to become party to the ESCAP agreement by ratifying the same and thereafter put forward the amendment proposal. But such advice was not considered logical, because once the ESCAP sponsored route is accepted it would be hard to change.

The present regime, however, accepted the logic to become a party to the agreement and ratified the ESCAP sponsored Asian agreement in August last.

After becoming party to the agreement, officials concerned felt that an amendment proposal to the original agreement should be proposed to accept the Cox''s Bazar-Myanmar route as one of the international routes. But the file could not move as no directive so far was received from the political authorities. The communications ministry officials feared that the amendment proposal might be dropped as there was indication that India would oppose the amendment proposal.

The communications ministry officials also said that they did not receive any encouraging response from Myanmar regarding Bangladesh''s demand to include Cox''s Bazar-Myanmar route as one of the international routes of the Asian Highway.

The maritime boundary dispute with Yangon compounded the whole gamut of bi-lateral relations. Both Myanmar and India have taken a common stand against Bangladesh''s claim regarding maritime boundary.

Bangladesh has already approached the UN arbitration to find a logical solution to Bay boundary dispute with its two neighbours. Two Indian nationals would plead in favour of Yangon and Delhi, which would create a great problem for Bangladesh.

In such a situation concerned officials feel that Yangon might side with India and might not support Bangladesh demand for the amendment to the Asian Highway agreement.

A senior official of the communications ministry said that Myanmar did not respond to the RFP (request for proposal) sent to them for their concurrence to develop Gumdung-Bawalibazar road, which would be developed by Bangladesh at its own expense. The understanding of developing the Gumdung-Bawalibazar was reached during the last 4-party alliance government.