KARACHI: "Pakistan has high geographical as well as geo-political significance in the region which should be utilized diplomatically to ensure our social and economic development in the region," stated by FPCCI vice president Sheikh Sultan Rehman during an interactive webinar on 'Geo-Political Challenges Faced by Pakistan,' organized by FPCCI.

While sharing views on the topic, Sheikh Sultan Rehman said Pakistan has tricky diplomatic relations with Afghanistan, Iran and particularly India on Kashmir issue, increasing international influence of China, the position of US in the global arena, acceptance of Israel by some gulf nations are a few incidents in the recent history which have changed the paradigm of geo-politics globally.

While discussing, Qaisra Sheikh said military, economic stability, ideological leadership and good governance are the four pillars of a strong nation, Pakistan is lucky to have a strong military however economic growth, strong leadership and good governance will raise our significance in the region.

Dr Asghar Ali said Covid-19 has taught us that import dependency and dependence on remittances from Middle East are one of the reasons that are making our geo-political position weak. While expressing her views, Dr Seema Shafique Khan said Pakistan is not in position to escape or evade from the emerging geo-political challenges and must realize that no economy can survive in isolation in the global village.

Prof Abdul Jabbar said a weak economy cannot project influence in the region. Talking about the issues faced by Pakistan internally, he stated that horizontal and vertical polarization is breaking our internal strength and Pakistan has to become strong internally to emerge as a influencing nation in external affairs. Naser Hyatt Magoon highlighted the significance of Pak-China relations and CPEC in our efforts to gain a better of stronger influence on geo-political arena.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020