During visit to China, Shehbaz to seek new investments, debt rescheduling
Oct 22, 2022
Beijing [China], October 22 : Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif's agenda for his maiden visit to China in November is to seek new investments worth billions of dollars and urge Beijing for rescheduling its debt, media reports said.
In a further expansion of CPEC, Pakistan will seek a multibillion-dollar financing window from China to fund 10,000 megawatts solar-powered electricity generation projects, media reports said.
This comes as Sharif chaired a meeting on Wednesday to review and finalise the agenda for his Beijing visit which is expected to be scheduled for November 1st. Pakistan is eyeing to get China onboard to finance many projects and new schemes worth billions of dollars. This also includes a tripartite agreement between China, Pakistan and Saudi Arabia to set up an oil refinery in Gwadar, reported The Express Tribune.
The Pakistani government has plans to set up 10,000 MW solar power plants. The cost of the plants is an estimated USD 5 billion. "We are keen to get up to USD 2 billion Chinese financing and will pitch a generalised framework agreement for signing during the PM's visit," said an official of the energy ministry.
However, whether these Chinese financing be approved will depend on the international competitive bidding for the plants. It will also depend on the endorsement by the Joint Cooperation Committee (JCC) of the CPEC meeting. It is pertinent to note that the 11th session of the JCC is also tentatively scheduled for October 27, reported The Express Tribune quoting officials.
According to officials privy to these discussions, Saudi's Aramco has shown an interest in giving the contracts to Chinese companies for the refinery deal. Moreover, China's East Sea Group has also offered to establish a five million tonnes capacity oil refinery in Gwadar's Free Zone with an investment of USD 3.6 billion.
Another point of discussion will be the non-payments of dues by the Chinese Independent Power Plants (IPP). These dues are around Rs 240 billion. In this matter, the Economic Coordination Committee of the cabinet is expected to approve a bank account for CPEC with around Rs100 billion before the PM's visit in an attempt to remove the bottleneck.
