ISLAMABAD, July 25 (APP): Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Hina Rabbani Khar on Tuesday chaired a meeting with Pakistan’s envoys in the European Union countries.
She discussed with envoys the export of human resource from Pakistan to the European Union countries.
Representatives from the Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis, NAVTTC, NUML and PSEB also participated.
The meeting reviewed progress on various initiatives on migration, mobility and human resource export.
ISLAMABAD, July 25 (APP): Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Tuesday said that the the government had established a robust mechanism in form of the Special Investment Facilitation Council to attract investments with a view to do away with the “addiction” of borrowings and put the country on the course towards self-sustainability.
The prime minister, addressing the participants of the third meeting of International Partners Support Group (IPSG), said the government had chalked out an economic revival plan. Its implementation would require foreign investment and technical support from the friendly countries to enhance per acre yield of wheat, sugarcane and other commodities and focus on other areas of action.
He thanked the member countries and organsiations for supporting Pakistan amidst the difficult time of unprecedented floods and told them the people still awaited return to their homes as they lacked funding to rebuild the destroyed houses. This shows the severity of the challenge which required untiring efforts by the government, friendly countries and the international partners to help Pakistan build climate resilient infrastructure.
The prime minister thanked and appreciated the federal ministers for planning, climate change, finance, economic affairs and foreign affairs and their teams for reaching out to the international community and organise Geneva Conference and where international commitment were made.
He told the participants that the country had been facing economic challenges like international inflation in terms of crude oil and commodities prices.
He said as the government had reached an agreement with the International Monetary Fund (IMF), it would strictly abide by it without any deviation.
He said his government’s term was about to end by the next month, the upcoming interim government would also surely be adhering to the IMF deal as the first tranche had already been received.
He thanked the friendly countries and IMF Managing Director for helping Pakistan to reach the $3billion agreement for a nine-month period.
He said the SIFC would focus on promotion of agriculture sector and introduction of value added products which would obviously require an infrastructure to be built from the investment from Gulf nations, America, North America or any other country desiring to invest.
Besides, the Council would also help promote the IT and mining sector as the country was rich with immense potential in both sectors.
Prime Minister Shehbaz assured the meeting that every penny coming from the donors for the rehabilitation of the flood victims would be spent transparently.
He directed the relevant authorities that transparency should be given key importance in the rehabilitation and reconstruction projects of flood affected areas. Third party validation should be ensured in every project, he directed.
In the meeting, progress on flood recovery in Pakistan was reviewed. The prime minister appreciated the important role of IPSG in increasing cooperation as well as for climate resilience projects.
It was told that $657.5 million were estimated to be received by June 30, 2023 under the pledges made for various projects during the Climate Resilient Pakistan Conference, while $715 million have been received from donors and friendly countries for these projects. During the current year 2023-24, around $913.5 million will be spent on construction and rehabilitation projects in flood affected areas under the donors support.
The meeting was further informed that 19 projects have been designed for flood prevention and rehabilitation of victims, including eight for Sindh, seven for Balochistan, three for Khyber Pakhtunkhwa and one for the whole of Pakistan.
The meeting was told that 64 percent of the money received for relief work was being spent in Sindh.
It was told that $16.2 billion was estimated for reconstruction under the 4-RF (4RF), of which $8.15 billion are being funded by the federal and provincial governments through PSDP and ADP, while the matching amount will be provided by friendly countries and international organizations.
On this occasion, UNDP Resident Coordinator Samuel Rizk said that one year had passed since the disastrous floods in Pakistan and the presence of all partners to review the progress of the rehabilitation works was welcoming.
He said the rehabilitation of flood affected areas was possible only with the cooperation of all partners and UNDP would continue to play its full role in this regard as the Secretariat of the International Partner Support Group.
Federal ministers Ishaq Dar, Sardar Ayaz Sadiq, Sherry Rehman, Minister of State Hina Rabbani Khar, Special assistants Tariq Fatemi and Tariq Bajwa, representatives of UNDP, World Bank, European Union, ADB, IMF, USAID, and diplomats from America, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, China, Canada, Qatar, United Arab Emirates, Japan, South Korea, Germany, Azerbaijan, Italy and Norway, and other relevant high officials participated in the meeting.
UNITED NATIONS, Jul 25 (APP): The United Nations has started a complex operation to transfer crude oil from a decaying supertanker stranded off the coast of Yemen since 2015.
The 19-day operation will pump more than one million barrels out of the rusting vessel, the Safer, which was abandoned over eight years ago, to a nearby replacement vessel.
Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said the UN has taken on the delicate operation as a spill would spell environmental catastrophe for the region.
“United Nations has begun an operation to defuse what might be the world’s largest ticking time bomb. This is an all-hands-on-deck mission and the culmination of nearly two years of political groundwork, fundraising and project development” said the UN chief.
Lying north of the Yemeni port Hudaydah, UN officials have warned for years about the possibility that the 47-year-old tanker could crack and explode.
The supertanker holds four times the amount of oil spilled by the Exxon Valdez – enough to make it the fifth largest oil spill from a tanker in history.
UNDP warned that a massive spill from the Safer would destroy swathes of marine life in the Red Sea.
Speaking to reporters in Geneva, spokesperson Sarah Bel expressed concern for the fishing communities on Yemen’s Red Coast, already living in a crisis-wracked situation, as a spill would like ‘wipe out 200,000 livelihoods instantly” and “fish stock would take twenty-five years to recover.”
Describing the operation as the first of its kind, she exercised caution during this “emergency phase” but assured reporters that everything had been put in place to “secure success.”
The FSO Safer has been moored some 4.8 nautical miles southwest of the Ras Issa peninsula on Yemen’s west coast for more than 30 years. In 2015, production and the maintenance of the tanker stopped due to the eight year conflict between a pro-Government Saudi-led coalition, and Houthi rebels. As a result, the vessel is now beyond repair.
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