How Football Resurrected Argentina-Bangladesh Relations – The Diplomat

Through the 1971 World Desk Tennis Championships, a 19-year-old American participant named Glenn Cowan by chance boarded a shuttle bus transporting the red-shirted Chinese language nationwide workforce. The workforce’s star participant, Zhuang Zedong, approached Cowan to shake his hand, converse with him by way of an interpreter, and provides him a present. The U.S. workforce was later prolonged an all-expenses-paid invitation to go to China by Mao Zedong, the founding chief of the Folks’s Republic, in what turned often called “ping-pong diplomacy.” America lifted its embargo towards China on June 10, 1971, adopted by the opening in relations between the 2 international locations led to by ping-pong diplomacy.

The identical 12 months, Bangladesh, a brand-new nation, debuted on the world stage following a nine-month lengthy struggle for independence. Because the nation’s founding, Bangladesh has adhered to the motto “friendship to all, malice to none,” and has taken half in a wide range of multilateral boards. Dhaka needs to ascertain pleasant bilateral relations with international locations starting from Asia to Europe to America.

From the start, Bangladesh discovered a pal in Argentina. Victoria Ocampo, Jorge Luis Bergs, Reverend Father Ismael Quiles, and different distinguished intellectuals, students, artists, attorneys, and authors of impressed and guided the intelligentsia of Argentina and Venezuela to denounce the brutal actions of Pakistan and search help for struggle refugees through the turbulent months of the liberation struggle of Bangladesh. The opening of a diplomatic mission in Argentina in 1972 marked the start of the official diplomatic relations between Bangladesh and Argentina.

However the golden age abruptly led to 1978, when Argentina closed its embassy in Dhaka. Bangladeshi nationals must journey to New Delhi, India with the intention to acquire Argentine visas, because the Argentinian Embassy there additionally handles relations with Bangladesh.

There have been few notable developments within the bilateral relationship since, apart from the official go to of the previous international secretary of Bangladesh, Mohamed Mijarul Quayes, to Argentina in 2011 and the journey to Dhaka by Argentine Undersecretary of Overseas Coverage Claudio Javier Rozencwaig, and Argentine Ambassador to India and Bangladesh Hugo Gobbi, to mark the fiftieth anniversary of bilateral diplomatic relations.

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Nonetheless, the Bangladeshi public contains many enthusiastic followers of the Argentine nationwide soccer workforce, one thing that acquired an excessive amount of media consideration through the FIFA World Cup in December 2022. The organising of large screens in varied places throughout the nation to observe the Messi-led renaissance of Argentina and the hundreds of followers who gathered to rejoice every objective and triumph of their most well-liked workforce caught the eye of everybody from FIFA to the Argentine Soccer Affiliation and their residents as effectively.

As quickly because the final whistle sounded within the Argentina-France World Cup remaining recreation, Bangladeshi Argentine followers of all ages and social courses got here out onto the streets and began to fly the flags of their beloved adopted nation. Nearly each nook of the nation noticed victory marches after Argentina’s remaining triumph.

Argentina expressed its love and respect to Bangladeshis in return. Argentina’s soccer affiliation has already expressed gratitude to the Bangladeshi folks for his or her unconditional help. A couple of Argentine journalists began to tweet in Bengali in help of the Bangladesh Cricket Workforce after their latest triumph towards India in a bilateral ODI collection.

What’s extra, Argentina’s Overseas Minister Santiago Cafiero introduced in a tweet that his nation plans to reopen the Argentinian embassy in Dhaka. He cited elevated commerce and a shared curiosity in partaking in a variety of areas, together with sports activities. Cafiero is anticipated to journey to Dhaka in March 2023 to supervise the reopening of the embassy.

Argentina and Bangladesh’s shared appreciation and respect could solely be the start of exploring new alternatives for bilateral relations. The 2 international locations have solely been capable of contact the floor of the total potential of their growing relationship so far. Argentina exported $450 million value of products to Bangladesh in 2020; that elevated to $791 million in fiscal 12 months 2021–2022. Wheat, soybean meal, and soybean oil have been Argentina’s prime exports to Bangladesh. Because the world is going through a troublesome time of rising costs and world inflation, Argentina could also be a possible different marketplace for Bangladesh.

In distinction, Bangladesh bought items to Argentina value $17.3 million in 2020. Bangladesh’s exports to Argentina have grown over the previous 25 years at a yearly price of 6.46 p.c, from a low base of $3.61 million in 1995. Knit sweaters, knit t-shirts, and non-knit males’s fits have been the principle exports from Bangladesh to Argentina. The ready-made-garment business contributed greater than 88 p.c of the exports in FY2021-22.

Based on a decision handed by the United Nations Common Meeting (UNGA), Bangladesh will graduate from the “least developed nation” (LDC) class to the “growing nation” class on November 24, 2026. After that, Bangladesh will face new challenges, as it’s going to regularly lose the privileges, quotas, and rights related to being “underdeveloped.” Argentina may be a possible marketplace for Bangladesh if it needs to diversify its garment business. Argentina might additionally import world-class items from Bangladesh at decrease prices, reminiscent of ceramics, melamine, ships, and prescription drugs. Moreover, the choice on the visa waiver settlement for Bangladeshi diplomats and authorities officers could also be reevaluated by Bangladesh and Argentina.

Regardless of the distinction between Nineteen Seventies ping-pong diplomacy and twenty first century soccer diplomacy between Bangladesh and Argentina, grassroots cooperation was the important thing in reviving state-level contacts in each situations. The trail to a bilateral relationship between Bangladesh and Argentina reemerged by way of people-to-people trade, the media revolution, and sports activities diplomacy.