Agartala, (Samajweekly) The Border Security Force (BSF) and the Border Guard Bangladesh (BGB) on Monday began their first ever virtual border management conference to deal with border crimes, single-row border fencing and insurgent activities, among other issues.
Officials said that the four-day BSF-BGB Border Coordination Conference (BCC) would adopt certain strategies to curb trans-border crimes, smuggling of various contraband and cattle, fake Indian currency notes and pending development works along the frontiers of the two neighbouring countries.
The Inspector Generals (IGs) of three frontiers – Tripura, Meghalaya and Mizoram & Cachar Frontier – along with BGB officials of the South-East and North-East regions took part in the virtual meeting on Monday. Senior officials of Bangladesh’s Foreign Affairs and Home Affairs ministries also took part in the meet.
“After the discussions, the leaders of both the delegations would amicably resolve all the bilateral issues to achieve the common goal of establishing peace and tranquility along the international borders,” a BSF statement said.
It said that embarking on the path of ‘confidence building measures’, the border guarding forces of India and Bangladesh have been forging ahead in their ever growing friendly association by participating in the biannual Border Coordination Conference as per the traditions.
The statement said that over the past few years, the BSF and the BGB have jointly cemented their friendly relationship and acquired new heights in mutual trust and cooperation by resolving all border issues through meaningful dialogues.
It may be recalled that the last such BCC was held in BSF Tripura Frontier headquarters in Shalbagan in November last year.
BSF’s Tripura frontier IG Susanta Kumar Nath had headed the Indian delegation while BGB’s Additional Director General Tanveer Gani Chowdhury led the Bangladesh team.
Four northeastern states — Tripura (856 km), Meghalaya (443 km), Mizoram (318 km) and Assam (263 km) — share 1,880 km borders with Bangladesh.
Most stretches of the borders remain unfenced and there are thousands of villages and human habitations close to both sides of the borders.
