Strengthening South Asian People's Solidarity for Democracy, Justice and Peace

PEOPLE'S SAARC - 2007

South Asia People's Assembly

23-25 March 2007, Kathmandu, Nepal

The First People's SAARC concluded here on Sunday, issuing a 31-point Kathmandu declaration. The declaration has urged all the parties concerned to act together to fight against poverty, injustice, imperialism and discrimination of gender, caste, religion, language and ethnicity.

With the objective of making efforts for a new and better South Asia, the People's SAARC had begun on March 23. People from all walks of life from all SAARC nations took part in the assembly.

"From monarchic or military dictatorship to exercise of dictatorial power under the guise of democracy and to 'functioning' formal democracies, all variations exist in the region," the declaration stated, and reiterated its demand to ensure democracy, human rights, justice, demilitarisation, denuclearisation of states and its machineries.

Stating that there should no barrier for free mobility of people across the region by guaranteeing the notion of visa free South Asia, the declaration demanded that the defence budget be reduced at least by 10 per cent. The money thus saved should be spent on education, health, employment and poverty reduction, it said.

It asked the SAARC to declare 2007 to 2017 a SAARC Dalit Rights decade with enactment of concrete Acts, policies, programme and action plans.

"As globalisation has resulted in eroding labour rights, we demanded to ensure enforcement of Core Labour Rights at work places including Special Economic Zones (SEZs)," the declaration stated. It called for the resolution of Bhutanese refugee issue and the problems facing the internally displaced people.

It also demanded the introduction of the provision of 50 per cent reservation for women in political, social and economic spheres of the societyand elimination of physical and mental violence against women.