ISLAMABAD - Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi would visit Pakistan later this month to reschedule the visit of President Xi Jinping for February, diplomatic sources said on Friday.
President Xi was earlier scheduled to visit Pakistan in mid-September last year but had to postpone it for unavoidable circumstances because of protest and sit in by Pakistan Tehreek-e-Insaf (PTI) and Pakistan Awami Tehreek (PAT) in Islamabad.
Diplomatic sources told The Nation that President Xi Jinping is likely to visit Pakistan next month to discuss bilateral relations and inaugurate energy projects to be carried out with the investment of Chinese companies. Last year, China promised Pakistan investment worth $42 billion in various fields as Islamabad and Beijing had signed 19 agreements and memorandum mostly related to energy sector. The new agreements paved the way for Chinese State-owned companies to help build at least four new power stations in Pakistan, while the deals also cover the supply and mining of coal in a bid to help Pakistan overcome its chronic electricity crisis. The deals signed between China and Pakistan are worth $42 billion and the whole investment is being made by China, Pakistan has for decades been China's closest ally in South Asia, and Beijing is a major trading partner and key supplier of military technology to Islamabad.Pakistan borders the far-western Chinese region of Xinjiang, which has seen a series of clashes and attacks on civilians that have left more than 200 dead in the past year.
Beijing blames some of the region's violence on an organised terrorist group it calls the East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM) seeking independence for the region, home to the mostly Muslim Uighur minority. On the other hand, people of Pakistan anxious for the Chinese President's visit to give shape and directions to a number of landmark projects, which are necessary for Pakistan's economy. These agreements envisaged an initial investment of $34 billion the China-Pak Economic Corridor Support Project (CPECSP) approved by CDWP.A number of new agreements/MoUs between Pakistan and China in the fields of energy, infrastructure, manufacturing, Railways, communication, information, media, culture etc were ready to be signed.
The Economic Corridor project become very significant after Pakistan gave control of its deep Gwadar port to China's State-owned China Overseas Ports Holding in February 2013.Built by Chinese workers and opened in 2007, Gwadar is undergoing a major expansion to turn it into a full-fledged transshipment hub to cater for the needs of landlocked Central Asian Republics. Pakistan and China have also signed agreements for constructing an international airport at Gwadar, upgrading a section of the 1,300-kilometre Karakorum Highway connecting China to Islamabad and laying a fibre-optic cable from the Chinese border to Rawalpindi. In the energy sector 14 power projects including hydel, wind and coal projects with total investment of 15.5 billion dollars and a
total production capacity of 10400 mega watts were likely to be signed during the visit.
Besides, projects having total production capacity of 6,120 mega watts are also contemplated to be installed with a total investment of 18.3 billion dollars. China is also pouring its investment into alternative energy production. Bahawalpur solar park in the South Asia and 100 mw wind energy project-II are under construction in this sector. The projects for the construction of Lahore-Karachi Motorway and the Raikot-Islamabad section, necessary for the construction of Bhasha Dam are also to be signed during the visit of President Xi Jinpang. Another Railway project for the expansion and reconstruction of existing line ML-1 having a length of 1736 km and Havelian Dry port are also to be constructed with Chinese investment at a cost of $3.7 billion.Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif has recently inaugurated construction of Pak- China motorway.The Chinese had also agreed to invest in the establishment of economic zone, an optical fiber cable project and in the field of communications at a total cost of US$ 1.64 billion dollars.
Chinese president to visit Pakistan next month