European Union (EU) Ambassador to Bangladesh Pierre Mayaudon yesterday encouraged the government and political parties to take more confidence building measures for a dialogue to address the core issues with regard to the political crisis in the country.
Although Bangladesh is enjoying a face of de-escalation, facilitated by the elections to the city corporation polls, the progress towards solution to the crisis is slow, he said.
“Luckily, we observe that we are now in the face of de-escalation and the elections to city corporations were pivotal in facilitating and encouraging the de-escalation,” Ambassador Mayaudon told a programme styled DCAB Talks organised by  Diplomatic Correspondents Association, Bangladesh (DCAB) at a hotel in the capital.
“We have to see. We know progress is there, but the progress is fragile. So, we always encourage our interlocutors from the government from the political parties to go forward into more confidence building measures for dialogue in order to address the core issues relating to the crisis,” he added.
The envoy also said that the EU always raised with the government the issues relating to political situation, freedom of media and human rights.
Mentioning the meeting between the Foreign Minister and EU and other European envoys on January 14, he said that a communiqué had been issued after the meeting
voicing concerns ‘regarding political situation, absence of dialogue and consequences for the ordinary people
of this country’.
There were also more concerns about three months of hartals and blocades that targeted innocent people, he added.