Pakistan and China on Friday decided to welcome ‘any third country’ willing to joining the multi-billion-dollar China-Pakistan Economic Corridor for “mutual beneficial cooperation”.
“As an open and inclusive platform, both sides welcomed interested third parties to benefit from avenues for mutually beneficial cooperation opened up by CPEC,” according to Foreign Office.
A statement by the Pakistan foreign office said that, the 3rd meeting of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) Joint Working Group (JWG) on International Cooperation and Coordination (JWG-ICC) was held in virtual mode and was co-chaired by Foreign Secretary Sohail Mahmood and China’s Assistant Foreign Minister Wu Jianghao.
Both sides have agreed on continued implementation of CPEC projects and to expand it in jointly agreed priority areas. Both sides also noted that as a flagship of the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), CPEC had broken new ground in strengthening international and regional connectivity, especially in the context of its extension to Afghanistan, according to NDTV.
A combination of transport and energy projects under construction in Pakistan since 2013, CPEC is a flagship project of China’s Belt and Road Initiative. While its original value was pegged at $47 billion, it is now valued at $62 billion.
Foreign Secretary Mahmood stressed on the importance of the time-tested Pakistan-China All-Weather Strategic Cooperative Partnership in Pakistan’s foreign policy.
The minister insisted that vitality and dynamism of CPEC underscored the deep-seated mutual goodwill that was the anchor of the China-Pakistan bilateral relationship.
“The timely completion of CPEC projects and steady progress on realising important projects in the pipeline was energising bilateral cooperation and further strengthening the foundation for Pakistan’s economic modernisation and enhancing the capacity for sustained progress and prosperity,” he said.
According to NDTV, CPEC was launched in 2015 with the objective to increase connectivity in Pakistan and China by building roads, energy projects and industrial zones in Pakistan.
