Prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee made a reference to the potential of IOR economic cooperation during his opening address at official-level talks between the Indian and Omani delegations at Salalah, a green oasis some 1,000 km away from the Omani capital of Muscat.

The Oman visit, which forms the first leg of Vajpayee's four-nation tour that will take him to Namibia, South Africa (for the NAM summit) and Mauritius, was a last-minute addition to the premier's programme. It underlines the close economic and political relationship that India has nurtured with Oman, where some three lakh Indians are employed.

Vajpayee, who made eloquent references to age-old Indo-Omani trade and cultural ties, said that the IOR-ARC was one way of "seeking to retrieve our common history after three millennia of maritime cooperation was ended 500 years ago with the advent of colonialism in our waters."

Said Vajpayee: "We are enthusiastic supporters of this association and see it as an important aspect of south-south cooperation."

India, Oman and Mauritius are three of the most enthusiastic supporters of the IOR-ARC idea, which includes 11 countries: South Africa, Australia, Mauritius, Mozambique, Kenya, Tanzania, Indonesia, Sri Lanka, Malaysia, Singapore and Yemen. South Africa, which was initially warm to the idea of the association, has recently been slow to respond to new initiatives.

That, however, is not the case with Oman, which has proposed setting up an IOR-ARC chamber of commerce. It is also planning what could ultimately become a $4 billion ultra-modern port at Salalah as the prime container transshipment point for IOR-ARC trade apart from other regional trade.

Mauritius is already gearing up to house the association's secretariat.Apart from the IOR-ARC, India is pushing the idea of another regional trade grouping called Bimstec -- an acronym for Bangladesh, India, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, Thailand Economic Cooperation.

Clearly, while the Saarc preferential/free trade area is the prime economic bloc from India's point of view, the government is working on other trade groupings to make sure that its attempts to create a trade bloc in this Indian Ocean area is not permanently held hostage to Indo-Pakistani problems.While India has already announced a unilateral removal of import restrictions on around 2,000 items from the Saarc area, it is planning to stress the importance of other complementary trade blocs -- neither of which will have Pakistan as a member and spoiler.