Pak-China joint group meets ahead of JCC session

ISLAMABAD: Ahead of holding the upcoming Joint Coordination Committee (JCC) session scheduled next week, Pakistan and China on Monday held a joint working group (JWG) meeting as part of preparation for the upcoming JCC meeting.

The Pakistani side proposed the inclusion of “Water Resources Management and Climate Change” as a new area of cooperation under the framework of CPEC for efficient water resources management and development of climate resilient infrastructure.

The JCC is expected to be held virtually on October 27, 2022 ahead of the upcoming visit of Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif next month. According to official statement issued by the Ministry of Planning, the third meeting of the joint working group (JWG) between the government of Pakistan and the People’s Republic of China was held on Monday to review the long-term plan of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC).

The meeting was co-chaired by Ministry of Planning, Development and Special Initiatives Secretary Syed Zafar Ali Shah and Pan Jiang through a video conference after the interval of three years. Director General of the National Development and Reforms Commission of China, representatives of the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Aviation, Finance, Economic Affairs, Gwadar Port Authority, Gwadar Development Authority as well as the representatives of their counterparts in China also attended the meeting.

The meeting reviewed and summarised the implementation status of the CPEC projects and deliberated upon the future course of action with regard to implementation of the CPEC’s long-term plan. Both sides expressed satisfaction on steady progress made on various projects and agreed to start deepening the work done and then execution of the second phase of CPEC, which is focused on agriculture and industrial cooperation, science and technology, information technology and socio-economic development.

It was noted that since the last meeting of JWG on planning and CPEC’s long-term plan held in November, 2019, a number of developments have taken place. Globally, this period remained marred by the Covid-19 pandemic, preventing free movement of people between countries and regions. Despite these restrictions and difficulties posed by the pandemic, substantial progress has been achieved.

Both sides noted that out of 26 CPEC-Early Harvest Projects, 14 projects, including Karachi-Lahore Motorway: Multan-Sukkur Section, KKH (Phase-II) upgradation and reconstruction from Raikot to Islamabad via Mansehra, Eastbay Expressway, 1320 MW Port Qasim Power Plant, 1,320MW Sahiwal Power Plant and 720 MW Karot HPP, etc. have been completed, while currently, five projects, including New Gwadar International Airport and 873 MW Suki Kinari HPP are under execution. The meeting was also informed that the government was actively implementing various projects, in close collaboration with the provincial governments to ensure efficient and timely completion with a view to make the CPEC a roaring success and directly monitoring the progress of these projects on a monthly basis.

The two sides resolved to redouble the efforts to tap the full potential of cooperation as well as make sure that the people of Pakistan fully benefit from these projects by utilising the massive opportunities being created in various sectors.