China to help Pakistan host SCO moot, says ambassador

China’s Ambassador to Pakistan Jiang Zaidong on Friday emphasised the need for deepening cooperation by expediting the existing projects in order to help Pakistan consolidate its development foundation.

He was delivering a talk titled ‘How the third plenary session of the 20th Central Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC) will Benefit Pakistan and Sino-Pak Relations’ at Quaid-e-House Museum. The event was hosted by the Karachi Council on Foreign Relations.

The envoy said that in the next step, the two countries should promote the upgradation of the ML-1 and the Karakorum road projects, calling for expediting work on the year-round opening of the Khunjerab Pass and the construction of Gwadar Port.

Guided by the spirit of the third plenary session of the 20th CPC Central Committee, he said China stood ready to strengthen exchanges of state-government experiences with Pakistan and jointly advance modernisation in our respective countries.

He highlighted that under President Xi Jinping’s leadership, China has made a series of very important achievements like it won the battle against absolute poverty with close to 100 million poor people lifted out of poverty and built a moderately prosperous society in an all-around way.

Underlining the achievement’s significance to the whole world, Zaidong said China has contributed to over 70 per cent of the global poverty reduction and contributed to more than 30 per cent of the global growth for many years.

The ambassador said the session adopted a resolution to advance the Chinese modernisation through reforms. “As President Xi Jinping has pointed out, the modernisation that we are pursuing is not for China alone, but we look forward to achieving modernisation together with all the countries, including the vast developing countries so no one should be left behind on the path to modernisation,” he stressed.

He highlighted that at the Beijing Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation, the Chinese president delivered an important keynote speech outlining key initiatives about how to jointly advance modernisation that puts the people first and ensure that all will benefit from this process. The president called for modernisation model that is eco-friendly and jointly push for the global transition to green and low-carbon development and jointly advance modernisation underpinned by peace and security and work together to uphold the world peace and stability, he added.

He said that though Xi Jinping addressed the China-Africa cooperation, this was also an important guiding significance for China and Pakistan to jointly advance modernisation.

“We aim to work closely with Pakistan to learn from each other, support each other through various methods, such as party-to-party exchanges, and practical cooperation, and also people-to-people exchanges in order to both share development experience and also provide the development boost for Pakistan so as to jointly achieve the modernisation in our two respective countries and make our own contribution to the global modernisation.”

Recalling Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif’s visit to China, the Chinese envoy said an important consensus was reached between top officials of the two countries on advancing China-Pakistan strategic cooperation and the CPEC construction and providing a clear direction and guidance for the further development of our bilateral relations.

He lauded Shehbaz Sharif for holding meetings every month to monitor progress on the agreed projects during his visit. “We have made several achievements in the further implementation of the consensus. For example, we have been maintaining close discussions on the further advancement of our cooperation in the energy and infrastructure sectors, and also we have reached a consensus and prepared for the year-round opening of the Khunjerab Pass.”

Highlighting Pakistan’s advantages in agriculture and the mining sector, Ambassador Jiang Zaidong said that even though Pakistan may have a trade deficit with China, its agriculture trade with China has enjoyed a tremendous trade surplus. “For example, last year, the bilateral agriculture trade amount between our two countries reached $1 billion. Among which, Pakistan enjoys a trade surplus of $600 million.” He said in the mining sector, Pakistan has very rich mining resources, including rich offshore oil and gas resources.

“This cooperation will help Pakistan to turn its resources advantages into the fund resources in order to better help the country to alleviate its foreign exchange reserves shortage and to alleviate financial difficulties in the short term.” He vowed to help Pakistan in technology and industrial sectors.

He said Beijing attached great importance to Pakistan’s status and role in the global South countries so it would like to closely work with Islamabad to implement President Xi’s global south initiative well, and to inject stronger impetus for the common development, solidarity and cooperation of the global South, and to take the lead in building a community with a shared future for mankind.

He said Pakistan will hold the SCO Council of Heads of Government meeting soon. “We would like to work closely with Pakistan and also Russia to enhance our cooperation under the SCO framework, especially to help Pakistan to hold this meeting well, and to help Pakistan to play a bigger role in the regional and international affairs.”

KCFR Chairperson Nadira Panjwani highlighted the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor is a flagship project that symbolized the tremendous potential for countries’ trade and regional connectivity. She said Pakistan’s economic crisis, a rising debt burden and instability had caused problems in several areas and China had naturally moved to a more cautious investment strategy.

“Our political instability and leadership transitions have slowed down continuity and implementation of many CPEC projects, but the revitalisation of the CPEC was on top of Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif’s agenda when he visited China earlier in June this year.”

She maintained that against the backdrop of the fading relations with Islamabad’s previous allies, China had now emerged as Pakistan’s biggest trading partner. “There are many in the neighborhood and beyond who do not want to see advancement of the CPEC, but given the strong bonds of understanding and trust between our two nations, disrupting and sabotaging our friendship would be almost impossible,” she added.

Envoy visits KU

Separately, a Chinese delegation, led by Chinese Ambassador Jiang Zaidong, visited the University of Karachi and met Vice Chancellor Prof Dr Khalid Mahmood Iraqi and Pakistani Director of the Confucius Institute at KU Prof Dr Muhammad Nasiruddin Khan, and others.

Prof Iraqi said the KU has a very strong connection with the Sichuan Normal University of China and as a good partner, they have supported a lot in running the CI on the campus. He mentioned that the Chinese and Pakistani directors of the CI have played an important role in enhancing the facilities and standards at the KU’s CI.

Chinese Ambassador Jiang Zaidong appreciated Prof Iraqi’s opinion about the China-Pakistan relations and the CPEC development. He said Dr Iraqi had made a very comprehensive elaboration about our bilateral cooperation and relations and our international relations.

He said Prof Iraqi and the CI’s Pakistani Director Prof Dr Nasiruddin Khan have made a great contribution to the development of the Confucius Institute on the campus.

He expressed that the University of Karachi is such a large university with around 50,000 students, which is not very common in many countries.

He added that in China, we always say that we should count on education and talent to build up a strong country. So the cultivator of talents needs to be supported by education. “I think the University of Karachi will play a very indispensable role in promoting Pakistan’s national development. After I came to Pakistan, I noticed that the IT industry of Pakistan has developed very rapidly and Pakistan’s IT talent is world famous.”

The Chinese ambassador acknowledged that Pakistanis have started their business and entrepreneurship not only in their homeland, but their footprint has been covered around the globe, and he thinks that they cannot live without the education and cultivation of education institutions like the University of Karachi.

He shared that the cooperation between China and Pakistan has been very successful and promoting the education sector is the most important element in it. He said the Chinese government would like to provide further support for the University of Karachi’s development because China and Pakistan are all very strategic partners and our bilateral cooperation has covered all the aspects.

Jiang Zaidong said that we think education should be one of the focuses. During Pakistani Prime Minister Shaehbaz Sharif’s visit to China, both sides reached an important consensus on further enhancing our education cooperation, and we have prepared to take several further specific measures, including to help Pakistan to cultivate talent in IT and AI sectors. We would also like to help to train thousands of Pakistanis in the agricultural sector.

He informed the KU administration that we think of providing more scholarships to the Pakistani students as they are at the top rank, and would like to allocate more scholarships to the University of Karachi.

Speaking of the Confucius Institute, he thinks it is also one of the highlights of China-Pakistan cooperation. He mentioned that as he used to also work in other countries, he thinks the number of CIs in Pakistan is the highest, and the CIs in Pakistan are constructed the best. After experiencing that very unfortunate terrorist attack in 2022, the KU administration and the Pakistani Director of the Confucius Institute, and all the faculty members and teachers showed their commitment and continued the development of the Confucius Institute and have made a lot of efforts in this regard.

“According to my knowledge, you have operated this CI very well, and I would like to express my sincere gratitude. I think the importance and the significance of the CI lies in it is not only an important platform for our bilateral all-weather strategic cooperation, but also it is an important platform for practicing the Global Civilization Initiative. And we know that President Xi Jinping has proposed the GCI, and its purpose is to enhance the mutual exchange and the mutual learning between the different civilizations.”

Chinese Ambassador Jiang Zaidong said that we should learn and appreciate each other’s precious civilization and to further enhance the people-to-people exchanges and mutual understanding and to advance the development of different civilizations, we must share it together. We know that language is what takes civilization to spread as it is the bridge between the different civilizations.

He said that to build the CI well is not only to carry forward language learning but also to enhance the communications between civilizations, between the Chinese civilization and the Islamic civilization.