ISLAMABAD:
China’s Ambassador to Pakistan Jiang Zaidong said on Monday that Unit 5 of the Chashma NPP can create 40,000 jobs directly and indirectly during the peak construction period.
Addressing the first date-specific ceremony for Chashma Nuclear Power Plant Unit 5 (C-5), the ambassador congratulated and expressed gratitude to both countries for their long-term promotion of practical cooperation.
He said Pakistan has unique advantages in terms of location, language and human resources, which can be combined with China’s technology, capital and market experience advantages, to jointly explore third-party markets.
“We are pleased to see that according to the latest statistics of the State Bank of Pakistan, despite the overall sluggish economic environment, China’s direct investment in Pakistan accounted for 41% of the total investment in Pakistan in the last five months, which shows the vitality and potential of market-driven cooperation.” He said that over the past year, facing a complex international environment, China-Pakistan relations, especially practical cooperation between the two countries, have made progress.
“We are willing to continue working with Pakistan, adhere to high-quality development, combine quantitative growth with qualitative improvement, promote both large flagship projects and small but beautiful public welfare projects in a coordinated manner, and consolidate cooperation in traditional areas and constantly expand cooperation in emerging areas, in order to foster an improved version of CPEC.”
He said China will continue to work with Pakistan to write a new chapter of practical cooperation, accelerate the building of an even closer China-Pakistan community with a shared future in the new era, and continuously enrich the vivid practice of high quality. Belt and Road cooperation and promoting the construction of a community with a shared future for humanity. He highlighted the need to make coordinated efforts to promote the expansion and strengthening of non-CPEC projects. “China-Pakistan relations are long-standing, so our practical cooperation is naturally comprehensive.”
He said that the Khunjerab-Sost pass, the highest in the world, has served its purpose throughout the year.
The Suki Kinari hydropower plant, with a total investment of almost 2 billion dollars, has been put into commercial operation. The ambassador said: “These are just a summary of the achievements of China-Pakistan practical cooperation, but they are good enough to reflect the tenacity and certainty of China-Pakistan cooperation.”
He said: “We need to focus closely on an enhanced version of CPEC and take more targeted and practical measures to adhere to common development and build a growth corridor as the key is to make full use of Pakistan’s industrial advantages.”
The ambassador said: “We hope and believe that Pakistan will attach importance to maintaining and expanding this good momentum and provide better business to Chinese companies.” He said successful practice in energy and mining cooperation shows that non-CPEC projects have good benefits, great potential and broad prospects.
He expressed optimism that these projects can definitely become bigger and stronger, and be developed in a coordinated manner along with the CPEC projects, to jointly deepen the hard connectivity of infrastructure, soft connectivity of standards and heart connectivity between the peoples of the two countries. . These projects have not only brought considerable economic benefits, but have also created a large number of jobs and generated good social benefits, the ambassador added.
