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'SAARC Plus One' Summit
By KTM Metro Reporter
November 13, 2011: participating as an observer in the 17th SAARC Summit held in Addu City of the Maldives on November 10 and 11, 2011, China has quietly approached some South Asian nations for an annual summit of a "SAARC Plus One" but the concerned member states did not take up the issue at the summit for the fear of upsetting India, according to the news posted on thedailystar.net.
"China wants an annual summit with our eight members on the lines of its ASEAN Plus One arrangement," a senior diplomat from one of SAARC's smaller states told The Straits Times. "It is a move that annoys India, and most of us are just sitting quiet because we do not want to upset New Delhi."
Five years ago, Nepal, Bangladesh and Pakistan had jointly pressed the SAARC to admit China as an observer. India in turn proposed the observer status to the US, Australia and Japan at the SAARC meeting to counter the Chinese influence on the SAARC. Currently, SAARC has nine observer states.
http://www.thedailystar.net/newDesign/news-details.php?nid=209813
