The Programming Committee of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation convened its 59th Session at the SAARC Secretariat, Kathmandu, on Wednesday and Thursday.

The Programming Committee’s in-person session was held after a four-year gap, said the SAARC Secretariat on Friday.

The committee's 57th session was held at the SAARC Secretariat in Kathmandu on December 19, 2019, while the 58th session was held virtually on December 15, 2020.

Nepal currently holds the chair of the SAARC Programming Committee.

Sewa Lamsal, foreign secretary of Nepal and chairperson of the SAARC Standing Committee, was the chief guest of the inaugural session of the meeting.

In her inaugural address, she highlighted the need to hold regular meetings of the SAARC charter bodies.

"As the current chair of SAARC, the foreign secretary expressed the resolve of the government of Nepal to take necessary measures to steer the SAARC process, overcoming the challenges facing SAARC collectively," read the statement. Recognising SAARC as the viable platform for promoting peace and prosperity in South Asia through regional cooperation, she reportedly said that the association holds enormous potential to strengthen regional collaboration in areas such as trade, finance, transport, power, and connectivity, as well as people-to-people contacts.

Md Golam Sarwar, the SAARC secretary general, highlighted the urgency of making the regional grouping more “people-centric” so as to win the trust and confidence of the peoples across the region.

He stressed the need to promote people-to-people contacts as well as Public-Private Partnership to complement inter-governmental efforts in attaining the charter objectives of SAARC.

Rita Dhital, joint-secretary at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Kathmandu, chaired the 59th session of the committee in her capacity as its current chair.

The two-day session of the Programming Committee reviewed the current status of regional cooperation in the identified areas since its last session and gave guidance for forward movement in areas where the progress of work was tardy. The committee finalised the budgets and calendars of activities of the SAARC Secretariat, specialised bodies and regional centres for 2024, the statement said.

It also finalised the nomination of Dr Shahzad Afzalfrom of Pakistan for appointment as the director general of the South Asian Regional Standards Organization (SARSO), based in Dhaka, Bangladesh.