Hour-long meeting between Foreign Secretary and Peter Haas

Former US ambassador to Bangladesh Peter D Haas held a nearly hour-long meeting with Bangladesh's Foreign Secretary Asad Alam Siam on Thursday.

The meeting took place from 8:48 am to 9:30 am (Bangladesh time) at the foreign secretary’s office in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, according to multiple reliable sources who confirmed the matter.

Haas arrived in Bangladesh last Saturday on a weeklong visit. As part of the trip, he travelled to Cox’s Bazar on Wednesday and returned to Dhaka later that night.

He served as the US ambassador to Bangladesh from 2022 to 2024, concluding his tenure just days before a mass uprising in the country. Haas returned to the United States on September 27 and subsequently retired from the US Foreign Service. In October, he joined multinational energy company Excelerate Energy, which has investments in Bangladesh and operates a floating LNG terminal in Maheshkhali, Cox’s Bazar.

The company earlier said it sought to utilise Haas’s experience as Washington’s representative in Dhaka. As a result, he has continued to visit Bangladesh frequently even after his retirement.

On August 5, marking the first anniversary of the July uprising, several leaders of the National Citizen Party (NCP) visited Cox’s Bazar. At the time, speculation arose that they had secretly met with Haas. Reports suggested that party chief coordinator Nasiruddin Patwari and several other top leaders were present. The development triggered political debate, although Washington-based sources later clarified that Haas had been in the US during that period.

Throughout his tenure in Dhaka, Haas remained a subject of discussion for his meetings with political parties, statements, and activities that frequently made headlines.

After retirement, during a visit to Dhaka in April, he attended a meeting hosted by the US-Bangladesh Business Council, where discussions centred on bilateral trade, energy security, investment opportunities, and technology cooperation. The meeting was also attended by US Chargé d’Affaires Tracy Ann Jacobson. During the same trip, Haas also met Chief Adviser of the interim government, Dr Muhammad Yunus.

Now, only a few months after that visit, the high-profile former US envoy has returned to Dhaka—this time holding talks with Bangladesh’s foreign secretary.