THE joint press release issued after crucial Strategic Dialogue of Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi with his Chinese counterpart Wang Yi has once again confirmed the unique nature of relationship between the two neighbourly countries, unaffected by regional or global developments. The two sides reached consensus to collectively take measures to safeguard their common interests and promote peace, prosperity and development in the region. However, the highlight of the statement was China’s support for Pakistan to independently evolve policies suited to its national interests.
The strongly worded joint statement comes at a most opportune and relevant time as the country was facing outside pressure on several political issues mainly because of its economic vulnerability and multilateral institutions too are exploiting the weaknesses of Pakistan. There is a tendency to use assistance to influence policies and programmes of the recipient country but China stands out as an exception as its cooperation is motivated by its sincere desire to help others tackle their chronic problems. This is also evident from a related development – decision of China to allow Pakistan to utilize its one billion dollars deposited in the State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) for financing budgetary support. This would ease pressure on the Government as it would be able to meet budgetary requirements without knocking at the doors of other foreign creditors or raising the money from local banks (through borrowing). Chinese sentiments for Pakistan can also be judged by President Xi Jinping on Friday who described the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) as a “landmark project” under the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and said it is of great importance to promote in-depth development of the all-weather strategic cooperative partnership between the two countries. Beijing has also declared in categorical terms that Pakistan remains China’s “staunchest partner” in the region and that Beijing firmly supports Pakistan in safeguarding its territorial integrity, sovereignty and independence. In the backdrop of India’s illegal actions in Occupied Jammu & Kashmir, China has reiterated its position that it opposed any unilateral action that complicates the situation, adding the Kashmir issue is a dispute left over from history between India and Pakistan, which is an objective fact, and that the dispute should be resolved peacefully and properly through the UN Charter, relevant Security Council resolutions and bilateral agreements. This is a clear message to India that nothing except resolution of the dispute as per resolutions of UNSC is acceptable to China. People of Pakistan are grateful to Chinese leadership and people for their unwavering support to the cause of the country.
