C T Online Desk: This would be an outcome of a new collaboration on food security both countries had embarked on recently, Canadian High Commissioner to Bangladesh Dr Lilly Nicholls said at a reception she hosted on Thursday morning to mark Canada Day.
Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman is the father of the nation of Bangladesh.
Trudeau was the 15th prime minister of Canada in 1971 during the Liberation War of Bangladesh. He was the father of the incumbent Canadian prime minister, Justin Trudeau.
The high commissioner noted the “special relationship” that Canada and Bangladesh shared.
Canada was one of the first countries to recognize Bangladesh after independence in 1971.
“And from the very beginning, we were there when the country needed it most. We stayed with Bangladesh for the last 52 years at their time of need,” she said.
“And today, as the country develops and evolves and the relationship is strong, what makes it special is that it’s always been based on mutual respect and constructive dialogue.
“It doesn’t mean we always agree, but we always respect each other. The relationship is not only long-standing, but multifaceted, and it’s flourishing and leaping in leaps and bounds,” Nicholls said.
She gave a few examples of the kind of collaboration that both countries were engaged in, one of them being the construction of the agricultural technology centre in Bangladesh.
“In the past year alone, we put the first stone of what will become the first nursing teaching college, the National Teaching College of Bangladesh. We also began to build a women’s barrack for women peacekeepers of Bangladesh at Bipsot.”
She said both countries were also working in many other areas promoting human rights, particularly women’s rights, garment workers’ rights, union leaders’ rights and the rights of the Rohingya refugees.
Canada Day is the national day of Canada. It celebrates the anniversary of Canadian Confederation which occurred on July 1, 1867, with the passing of the British North America Act, 1867, when the three separate colonies of the United Canadas, Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were united into a single dominion within the British empire called Canada.
The high commissioner said Canada valued freedom, democracy, inclusion and diversity.
“And for those of you who don’t know, the Canadian story is really a story of continually building freedom.”
Diversity is what made Canada unique, she said, quoting the prime minister that in Canada, everybody had a shot of making it, of getting ahead, no matter what country one came from, no matter what one believed in, how one prayed or who one loved.
“And it’s those differences that are our strengths that make Canada unique.”
