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Karachi-Colombo tourism cruise mooted

DHAKA, Friday (AFP) - Bangladesh would like to see a plan mooted by Islamabad for sea cruises between Pakistan and Sri Lanka extended to Bangladesh, an official said Friday.

Tourism and Civil Aviation Ministry spokesman Saleh Ahmed told AFP such a move would enhance regional tourism and cooperation.

Bangladesh deputy Tourism Minister Mir Mohammad Nasirrudin had conveyed these views to his visiting Sri Lankan counterpart, Gamini Lokuge, in Dhaka on Thursday, he added.

The Karachi-Colombo cruise proposal is currently under consideration by the Sri Lankan government, he added.

Nasirrudin had told Lokuge that extending the cruise to the Bangladeshi port of Chittagong would mark "remarkable progress in the development of tourism in the South Asian region," Ahmed said.

Bangladesh and Sri Lanka are members of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation founded in 1985 also grouping Bhutan, India, Maldives, Nepal and Pakistan.

Lokuge, who arrived Thursday on a five-day goodwill visit, said his country was keen to cooperate with Bangladesh on tourism development and also to invest in the hotel business in Bangladesh's southern scenic coastal areas, which include the world's largest mangroves -- the Sundarbans.

Nasiruddin told Lokuge that Sri Lankan entrepreneurs were welcome to come to Bangladesh to take advantage of the special incentives being extended by Dhaka for private and foreign investors in the tourism industry.

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