Pakistan, US trying to remove some misperceptions to promote relations: Pakistani diplomat

CHICAGO, Apr 26 (APP):Pakistan and the United States (US) have been working on to remove some misperceptions in an effort to rebuild a mutually beneficial relationship, a senior Pakistani diplomat has said.
“Though there are some misperceptions on both sides, disengagement has never been a solution of issues in history,” Faisal Niaz Tirmizi, the consul general in Chicago, said during a public lecture at the University of Wisconsin in Madison on Wednesday.
Tirmizi was invited by the university, one of America’s top educational institutions, for a talk on Pakistan-US relations.
He said the geographical proximity with Afghanistan made Pakistan especially important for the United States.
The consul general talked about the sacrifices and efforts made by Pakistan during the ongoing war on terror, highlighting the successes of Pakistan’s armed forces in combating terrorists. Pakistan, he said, was perhaps the only country where extremist elements were being effectively pushed back without any external help.
Tirmizi also briefed the faculty and students of the university about rapidly growing economy of Pakistan. He said Pakistan’s enormous youth bulge had turned the country into the world’s fastest growing retail market. Pakistan’s retail market, he added, was the third largest retail market in Asia will cross $ 200 billion by 2020.
Speaking about the United States immense contributions to Pakistan’s economic, military and social development in the past, Consul General Tirmizi also referred Pakistan’s role in the two significant achievements of the US foreign policy — the US-China rapprochement and the decisive win against communism.