A file photograph of Pakistan’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Ishaq Dar
| Photo Credit: AFP
Pakistan will “seriously examine” whether or not to restart trade with India, mentioned its newly appointed Foreign Minister Mohammad Ishaq Dar. Responding to questions throughout a press meet in London, Mr. Dar mentioned he had been approached final 12 months by Pakistani businesspersons over the problem, and mentioned any choice would comply with a full dialogue with all stakeholders. Meanwhile, visiting Singapore, External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankarhit out at Pakistan for its “industry-level” assist to terrorism, stressing that any talks with Pakistan would wish to “face up to the problem”.
In 2019, each India and Pakistan had taken trade measures towards one another — after the Pulwama bombing in February, India had withdrawn the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) standing to Pakistan and raised tariffs on all trade multi-fold, whereas after India’s Article 370 strikes in Jammu and Kashmir in August 2019, Pakistan had suspended direct trade ties with India amidst various different diplomatic measures. The closure of trade had largely affected businessmen and transporters engaged on the Attari-Wagah land border, and on Sunday, the Amritsar-based chamber of commerce expressed hope {that a} rethink would comply with after the Pakistani Foreign Minister’s feedback, calling on New Delhi to reciprocate.
“What India did in 2019, the steps they took to amend the constitution and law, that was very painful,” mentioned Mr. Dar, talking in London on Saturday, the place he referred to UN resolutions on Jammu Kashmir. “But I think the business community of Pakistan is very keen [to restart trade]. When I presented the budget as Finance Minister last year, businessmen pointed out that the imports [from India] are coming in even today — they come via Dubai or via Singapore and involve higher freight, trans-shipment and other transportation costs,” he added, saying that each one stakeholders in Pakistan would “sit together and discuss what we can do, to the extent of trade and economic activities.”
Declines to remark
The Ministry of External Affairs declined to touch upon the remarks by the Pakistan Foreign Minister. Speaking on the National University in Singapore at an occasion about his guide, “Why Bharat Matters”, Mr. Jaishankar mentioned that in India the “mood is not to overlook” the problem of terrorism.
“It’s not a one-off happening…but very sustained, almost at an industry level, an assembly line of people whose job it is to do bad things [terror],” Mr. Jaishankar had mentioned on Saturday, responding to a query about bilateral ties with Pakistan. “India will not skirt this problem anymore. We are not going to say… [terrorism] happened, [but] let’s continue our dialogue because that’s very important… We must be honest enough to face up to that problem, however difficult it is.”
Speaking to The Hindu, the Amritsar-based Director of the Confederation of International Chamber of Commerce and Industry “welcomed” Mr. Dar’s initiatives for discussions on restarting trade and mentioned the suspension had left the Integrated Check Point at Attari constructed at appreciable funding “idle”.
“India had hugely invested in building the most modern land port here in 2012 fully equipped with all facilities, that handled about 200 trucks a day,” businessman Ashok Sethi instructed The Hindu. “We strongly urge the Indian government to react with positive intent as normal economic activity would be mutually beneficial to both the nations,” he added, estimating that hundreds of crores had been misplaced previously 5 years.
(With inputs from Vikas Vasudeva in Chandigarh)
