President Zardari on Thursday emphasised early finalisation of currency swap agreement between Pakistan and China, saying that such arrangements should be concluded with Turkey and Sri Lanka also to promote and facilitate bilateral trade with the countries.
This he said during a meeting on the proposed currency swap arrangements at Aiwan-e-Sadr on Thursday. The meeting chaired by the President was attended among others by Dr Abdul Hafeez Sheikh, Federal Minister for Finance, Revenue and Economic Affairs, Hina Rabbani Khar, MOS for Foreign Affairs, Governor State Bank of Pakistan, Shahid Kardar, Chairman BoI, Saleem H Mandviwala, Chairman Aptma Gohar Ejaz, Chairman Pakistan Business Council Asad Omar, senior government officials and spokesperson to the President, Farhatullah Babar.
Briefing media, Farhatullah Babar said that the Governor State Bank Shahid Kardar gave a detailed briefing on progress made so far regarding currency swap arrangements between People's Bank of China and the State Bank of Pakistan. He said that the proposed arrangement was being examined from a legal perspective.
Talking about similar arrangements with Turkey and Sri Lanka, he said that Turkish authorities have responded positively towards considering such arrangement with Pakistan. He said that a high level delegation from Pakistan recently visited Sri Lanka and held meetings with the Governor State Bank of Sri Lanka and Secretary Finance and held discussions on broadening economic co-operation between the two countries.
During the visit of President Zardari to Sri Lanka in November 2010, he had offered assistance to Sri Lanka in cement, sugar and dairy industry and had urged the business community to take advantage of liberal trade policies of the country, through joint ventures and investment. The President then addressing a business forum, comprising leading business personalities and corporate leaders, had emphasised upon the need to explore new and unconventional phase of economic co-operation marked by more trade, currency exchange and banking interchanges. The President had also proposed currency swap arrangement between Pakistan and Sri Lanka to reduce pressure on foreign exchange reserves of the two countries, Babar said. Similarly, the Turkish Prime Minister during his visit to Pakistan in October 2010 had welcomed currency swap arrangements with Pakistan, he continued.
During Thursday's meeting, the President recalled his meeting with the leaderships of China, Turkey and Sri Lanka and their interest for entering such arrangement with Pakistan. Later, Dr Abdul Hafeez Sheikh, Federal Minister for Finance, Revenue and Economic Affairs briefed the meeting about his recent meetings with the IMF officials.-PR