The economic managers in Islamabad have asked Pakistan government to grant the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status to India.
The economic managers in Islamabad have asked Pakistan government to grant the Most Favoured Nation (MFN) status to India as early as possible otherwise a seven-member regional trade body formed by India and called BIMSTEC could eventually replace SAFTA (South Asia free trade agreement) formed by the SAARC countries.
According to sources in the ministry of trade and commerce, the setting up of a regional trading bloc by India to enhance economic, trade and investment cooperation among seven Asian countries minus Pakistan has greatly perturbed the economic managers in Islamabad.
Pakistan maintains that it has been left out of the regional trading block — BIMSTEC (Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi Secotral, Technical and Economic Cooperation) — as a reaction to Islamabad’s persistent refusal to allow trade with India under the SAFTA (South Asia free trade agreement).
Sources said the trade and commerce ministry is in favour of granting MFN status to India given the fact that New Delhi had already conferred the same status on Islamabad unilaterally many years ago.
The officials regretted that Pakistan is reluctant to grant MFN status to India even under a ratified SAFTA. They say that the Indian authorities were expecting that with the ratification of SAFTA, Islamabad would grant the MFN status to New Delhi, as the agreement envisaged a duty-free trading area within the SAARC countries including Bangladesh, Nepal, Maldives, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan and Bhutan by 2018.
The officials have, therefore, suggested to the government authorities in Islamabad to grant the MFN status to India as early as possible otherwise the BIMSTEC would eventually replace SAFTA, thus causing huge economic loss to Pakistan.
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