"The committee will place a report at the summit to inform the Saarc leaders of the progress made so far in the negotiations," said Fazlur Rahman, a deputy secretary and negotiator for the government of Bangladesh.

He said the committee is yet to reach consensus on the contentious issues and will meet again on November 29 in Kathmandu aiming to wrap up talks by December.

The 13th Saarc summit is scheduled for November 12-13 in Dhaka.

So far, the CoE has held 11 meetings on reciprocal basis in the past one year and the negotiators are facing difficulty in reaching consensus mainly on four issues -- the rules of origin, sensitive list, mechanism for compensating LDCs for revenue loss to be caused by dismantling of tariffs, and technical assistance for Saarc LDCs.

"There are disagreements among the member countries on some key issues, which are supposed to be resolved in the 12th CoE meeting scheduled for November 29 in Kathmandu," said Fazlur Rahman.

He said the negotiators of the CoE are feeling extra pressure to wrap up the talks as the Safta is supposed to take effect from January 2006.

Although the member countries have already come to a consensus on the technical assistance issue, they are yet to reach an agreement on two vital issues - rules of origin and sensitive list, according to another negotiator, who is an official of the Tariff Commission.

He said in the last CoE meeting in Kathmandu on August 31, India placed a proposal on rules of origin, which the member countries, especially Bangladesh and the Maldives, disagreed.

Commerce ministry sources said the member countries have, however, come closer on the issue of compensation mechanism for the LDCs.

Tariff Commission sources said Bangladesh placed a sensitive list of around 1,300 items in the 9th CoE meeting to protect domestic industries from free flow of commodities within the region.

Bangladesh also submitted a list of 500 exportable items.