China committed to sharing “all we have” with Pakistan for common prosperity: CPAFFC President

ISLAMABAD,Nov.10(Gwadar Pro) - President of Chinese People’s Association for Friendship with Foreign Countries (CPAFFC) Lin Songtian said on Wednesday that China has a strong commitment, ability, and experience to share “all we have” with our brother (Pakistan) to achieve common prosperity.

Lin addressed as the keynote speaker at a roundtable hosted by the Institute of Strategic Studies Islamabad in collaboration with the Pakistan China Institute after arriving in Pakistan with a six-member delegation. He will also visit Rashakai Special Economic Zone (SEZ) and Karachi city.

CPAFFC is China’s national people’s organization engaged in people-to-people diplomacy featuring friendship cities, associations, and organizations.

“We came here for win-win cooperation and common development,” he said, adding that Pakistan is one of the earliest respondents and one of the largest beneficiaries of the Belt and Road Initiative(BRI) .

“We will build a platform for cooperation and exchanges between Chinese and Pakistani people, including media, businesses, academia, legislators, local governments, youth, think tanks, and others. We will receive friends and send out our people for capacity building. We will try to organize Chinese young and professional poverty relief cadres to stay in Pakistan and have a deep study of villages and local governments to find ways to fight poverty. We will also try to organize experts from the National Development and Reform Committee (NDRC) and local DRCs to Pakistan to study its national development plans, policies, and public services and encourage Chinese side to invest in Pakistan,” Lin said.

China and Pakistan currently have 18 pairs of friendship cities, and CPAFFC is willing to further promote exchanges and cooperation between local governments, especially friendship cities, in the fields of culture, education, tourism, public health, and vocational and technical schools, and to set up new friendship cities relations, he said.

Pakistan is an important hub along BRI. The road infrastructure is almost complete. Pakistan needs to ensure the safety of foreign investors, preferential policies, implementation of the law, ease of visa and work permits, multilateral and bilateral free trade arrangements, necessary facilities in SEZs, and speedy procedures and documentation to attract foreign investment, Lin advised.

The Chinese market is open to Pakistani brothers. Pakistan should focus on enhancing the production and processing of good-quality commodities which are in high demand in China, including Pakistani mangoes and marble, he said.