ISLAMABAD: Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Thursday said that in addition to attending the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics as a solidarity gesture, the visit of Prime Minister Imran Khan to China would encompass discussions on advancing joint ventures and speeding up progress on China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) projects.
In a statement ahead of Khan’s visit between February 3-5, Qureshi said Pakistan and China stood with each other in testing times and the main purpose of the visit was to express solidarity with China after several Western nations boycotted the Games on trumped-up claims.
In December, a small but influential group of Western countries including the United States and the United Kingdom announced diplomatic boycotts of the Beijing Olympics.
The boycott allows the nations to send athletic delegations to the Games while refusing to send any high-ranking officials or dignitaries as an official delegation.
In addition to the Games, Qureshi said, discussions would take place in line with the consultations of the special task force on boosting bilateral trade volume and economic stability.
The foreign minister mentioned the task force headed by the prime minister met several times, conducted sessions with stakeholders and formulated a policy guideline on exploiting trade potential between the two countries.
During his stay in Beijing, he said, Khan will meet the top Chinese leadership including President Xi Jinping.
He said economic diplomacy was the focus of Pakistan’s foreign policy to ensure the prosperity of the public.
To achieve this goal, he said, investment and bilateral trade with other countries particularly China has special significance, he added.
On hosting the 48th meeting of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation’s (OIC) Council of Foreign Ministers (CFM) on March 22-23, he said the meeting of Contact Group on Jammu and Kashmir had also been added to the schedule to discuss the situation in the occupied region.
