Dhaka’s relations with Beijing, Moscow don’t influence US-BD ties: State Dept official

A senior US State Department official has said Washington does not define its relationship with Bangladesh taking into account Dhaka's ties with Russia, China or any other country.

"US-Bangladesh relationship isn't defined by China, by Russia and any other country," US Deputy Assistant Secretary Afreen Akhter told BSS diplomatic correspondent Tanzim Anwar in an exclusive interview this week in the capital.

She said Washington had a broad range of multifaceted, multi-dimensional relationships with Bangladesh and found lots of synergies as Dhaka recently released its Indo-Pacific Outlook (IPO) as many of its elements were common with US Indo-Pacific Strategy (IPS).

"Broadly, we see a lot of synergies between our two documents, our strategy, and your [Bangladesh's] outlook. We both are focused on building economic prosperity in the region and through infrastructure, through our substantial development projects," the official said.

Bangladesh last month released its IPO envisioning a free, open, peaceful, secure, and inclusive Indo-Pacific region that appeared as Dhaka's expression of its cohesion with the IPS which has been pursued by the US in the region.

Akhter pointed out with a note of thanks that Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina's recent joint statement with Japanese premier Fumio Kishida "condemning Russia's invasion of Ukraine as a violation of an International law and the UN charter".

"I just want to say Prime Minister Hasina's recent statement on Russia…we really welcome it very positively," she said.

Indo-Pacific Outlook

The US diplomat welcomed Dhaka's announcement of the IPO and said the two documents – US's IPS and Bangladesh's IPO – share a "tremendous amount in common".

Apart from the US, the other members of QUAD – an informal strategic forum of the US, Australia, India and Japan – welcomed the Bangladesh IPO with Indian external affair minister S Jaishankar this week saying "We are glad" about Bangladesh's Outlook.

Akhtar said Bangladesh's IPO laid emphasis on the "maritime security" issue which was a key focus of the US and the other QUAD partners and "so we will look for opportunities to continue to collaborate on that".

She said economic growth is a key component of Bangladesh IPO while the US is the top export destination for Bangladesh as well as the top investor in Bangladesh and "so again we really look to build that out in the years to come".

Security cooperation

The US official said the US was currently working "very closely" with the Bangladesh government on the remaining elements of the General Security of Military Information Agreement (GSOMIA), a foundational government-to-government agreement that permits greater collaboration.

"We hope that (GSOMIA) will be signed in the coming months," she said without any elaboration further.

She said the US planned to provide radar technology in countries throughout the Indo-pacific region to develop a common operating picture in the maritime domain under its Indo-Pacific Maritime Domain Awareness Initiative.

RAB sanction

The US deputy assistant secretary said Washington was pleased to see "a substantial decrease of extra-judicial killings" after its sanction on Bangladesh's elite anti-crime Rapid Action Battalion (RAB).

"We welcome that decrease…[but] we need to see a long-term sustained trend, positive changes of behaviour [in RAB]," she said, adding that Washington focused on ensuring accountability, reform and transparency of RAB.

"I would say that with respect to lifting sanctions on the RAB, we need to see long-term systemic change for sanctions to be considered to be removed," the state department official said.

The deputy assistant secretary also said Washington was concerned about the application of Bangladesh's Digital Security and particularly "where the Digital Security Act has been applied".

Rohingya Issue

The State Department official said her country was working to find out a long term durable solution to the crisis through the repatriation of Rohinyas to Myanmar under the right conditions, a task she termed as "difficult and challenging".

"We believe very firmly that the conditions in Myanmar right now do not warrant a safe voluntary dignified return and so we would oppose any effort to forcibly repatriate individuals to Myanmar," she added.

Akhter said the US might take more Rohingyas to the USA in future under its third-country resettlement initiative which started last December.

Investment plans

Akhter said the US government was giving priority to Bangladesh's clean energy sector for investment. "We will be looking for opportunities to collaborate with Bangladesh on and looking forward (about energy sector cooperation)."

She said the US private sector's relationships with Bangladesh were incredibly strong though Bangladesh's regulatory environment needed to be improved to attract US business.

"Our trade attaché here is working with the government of Bangladesh for making Bangladesh's economy more transparent and more attractive for the US private sector investors".

Akhter led the US delegation at the 6th Indian Ocean Conference (IOC) hosted by Dhaka from 12 to 13 May.