Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen in a letter to his Turkish counterpart proposed postponement of the D8 Summit, which was scheduled to take place in Dhaka at the end of May 2020, officials said on Monday.
Turkey is the current chair of the D-8 Organization for Economic Cooperation, also known as Developing-8, a body for development co-operation among Bangladesh, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Malaysia, Nigeria, Pakistan and Turkey.
The minister also proposed that Bangladesh and Turkey can take joint initiatives to explore ways and means to restore confidence and devise strategies regarding potential negative consequences of the Covid-19 crisis on overall economy of the D8 member countries.
Meanwhile, at the initiative of Bangladesh the D-8 Health and Social Protection Programme (D-8 HSP), based in Abuja Nigeria, has decided to convene a virtual working meeting of the focal persons of the D-8 HSP on Thursday (April 16).
The move was taken realising the need for cooperation and solidarity of this economic-bloc of geographically dispersed eight countries to fight this pandemic, a foreign minister spokesperson said.
This meeting of the focal person is expected to come up with mechanisms to lessen the hardship through sharing best practices and resources.
It is also anticipated that the meeting will also find means to share number of developed and home-grown health innovation ecosystems and exchanges within or between D-8 countries.
In line with prime minister’s directive to engage at regional and global platforms to explore collective solutions on the Covid-19 crisis, Bangladesh took the lead to organise such a meeting of D8 HSP.
Bangladesh Delegation will be led by officials from the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS) and allied institutions who are part of the Covid-19 response team.
The D8 HSP virtual meeting will be supported by global health experts from observer and partner organisations like Chatham House, World Health Organization, ILO, IsDB, Global Women Leaders in Health and CHESTRAD International.
The D-8 nations are expected to use a research methodology to measure the health and socio-economic impact of the pandemic, the spokesperson added.
