SAARC Secretariat hosted the Second Meeting of the Expert Group of the Regional Railways Agreement and the Meeting of Experts on Demonstration Run of a Container Train were held back to back on 26-27 August 2011 and 28 August 2011, respectively.

The Expert Group finalized the text of the Regional Agreement on Railways which will be circulated for views/comments of the SAARC Member States. The other meeting discussed operational details of conducting a first ever Demonstration Run of a Container Train involving Bangladesh, India and Nepal initially, hoping to cover other SAARC Members in the future.

SAARC Leaders at the last Summit in Thimphu, pronounced the current decade as the decade of intra-regional connectivity in SAARC. In view of the declaration, these meetings assume special significance.