Commonwealth SG hails PM’s initiatives in achieving SDGs

Commonwealth Secretary General Patricia Janet Scotland has praised Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s development innovation named ‘the SDG-Tracker’ and championing women empowerment.

“Commonwealth under its Innovation Hub has placed Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina’s social innovation initiative of designing and creating ‘the SDG-Tracker’ for as a best practice for realizing Agenda 2030,” said the Secretary General.

Patricia also Baroness Scotland of Asthal made the remarks while receiving the newly-appointed Bangladesh High Commissioner to the UK and member of the Governing Board of the Commonwealth, Saida Muna Tasneem at the Marlborough House in London on Wednesday.

Bangladesh High Commissioner was briefing the Secretary-General about the social innovation initiatives undertaken by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina over the last ten years that have placed Bangladesh in the top brackets of social indicators in South Asia.

The Bangladesh envoy also briefed the Secretary General about PM Sheikh Hasina’s recent zero-tolerance political declaration on corruption and terrorism in order to promote good governance and rule of law.

The Commonwealth Secretary-General also lauded the Prime Minister for her sustained championing of gender equality and creating equal opportunity for all.

Muna Tasneem also affirmed Bangladesh’s commitment to celebrate the contribution of Her Majesty the Queen Elizabeth II as the Head of the Commonwealth on the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the Commonwealth.

In addition to the ‘Shalban forest’ proposed by Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during the 25th CHOGM, the high commissioner said Bangladesh would like to include another pristine forest ‘Lauachhora forest’ in Sylhet under the Queen’s Canopy.

The High Commissioner commended the Secretary-General on few of her new initiatives and reaffirmed Bangladesh’s commitment to work closely with the action groups under Blue Charter, Peace at the Crease, Commonwealth Innovation Hub and Faith initiative.

The High Commissioner also expressed Bangladesh’s keen interest to work closely with the Commonwealth in a number of areas including climate change, enhancing intra-Commonwealth trade, ICT, inter-faith harmony, industry 4.0 and good governance.

Source: bss