Pakistan and Poland on Monday signed five agreements and MoUs for cooperation in the fields of Defence, small and medium sized enterprises, education, science and culture. The agreements were signed from the Pakistani side by Defence Minister Rao Sikandar Iqbal, Foreign Minister Khursheed Mahmood Kasuri and Pakistani Ambassador to Poland Seema Ilahi Baloch and their Polish counterparts.
President Pervez Musharraf and his Polish counterpart Lech Kaczynski witnessed the signing ceremony. Meanwhile, Presidents of Pakistan and Poland, General Pervez Musharraf and Lech Kaczynski on Monday expressed full satisfaction over their talks and said they look forward to an enhanced, stronger, deeper and broad-based relationship between the two countries.
They were addressing a joint news conference in Warsaw after their one-to-one meeting and later expanded delegation level talks. President Pervez Musharraf said their talks had been fruitful and there was consonance of views on regional and international issues.
On bilateral side they had broad-based discussions on enhancing economic relations including increase in trade. They also discussed likely investment opportunities, interaction in the field of education and cultural exchanges. He said they also took stock of the possibility of cooperation in the defence production field.
General Pervez Musharraf said Pakistan held Poland in the highest of esteem because of its performance in political and economic fields, its present position in the European union.
He said he had come to Poland with a broad based agenda to improving relations between Pakistan and Poland and also developing a better and clearer understanding on important world and regional issues.
He said historically the two countries had old ties and referred back to 1940 during the Second World War when Pakistani city Karachi hosted to about 30,000 refugees from Poland. Also a Polish officer worked in Pakistan air force in the l960s.
The president expressed Pakistani nation''s gratitude for all the help and assistance that it got from Poland in the hour of need when Pakistan was struck by the world natural calamity on the 8th of October, 2005. The Polish president said they had very interesting and fruitful talks about important problems of the contemporary world, especially Pakistan.
He said Poland was a member of Nato and European Union and involved in important matters. He said Pakistan and Poland would continue talks and the visit of President Pervez Musharraf had been extremely satisfactorily and it would not be the last meeting they have had.
He said President Pervez Musharraf briefed him of the fresh initiatives, which were worth consideration. He said as far as bilateral relations are concerned, they had significant opportunities for their development including economic exchanges, trade development, cooperation in defence, political as well as cultural fields. He said he was deeply convinced that the agreements and MoUs signed today would lead to significant deepening of relations.