Pakistan, China sign 18 agreement and MoUs of coopertion

Islamabad, Nov 24 (UNI) Pakistan and China today signed eighteen agreements and memorandum of understanding (MoU) including the landmark free trade agreement (FTA) to promote economic, trade and investment relations between the two countries.

President Pervez Musharraf and the Chinese President Hu Jintao witnessed the signing ceremony.

Pakistan and China had completed negotiations on the FTA in a record short time after starting the process in August last year. The agreement will cut tariffs to zero rates on hundreds of items for import and export between the two countries.

Pakistani officials said ahead of the signing ceremony that they expected to take volume of bilateral trade to 15 billion dollars within next five years, with the implementation of the FTA.

The two countries also signed an agreement to kick off the Five Year Development Programme of Trade and Economic Cooperation.

The accord will put in place a comprehensive structural framework for boosting and economic ties.

Pakistan is the first country with whom China has entered into such an arrangement.

Under another agreement, the two countries will set up a joint investment company to provide an institutional mechanism for financial support to the private sector for undertaking joint ventures.

The two countries also signed fifteen other agreements and MoUs to promote economic and technical cooperation between their public and private sectors.

These agreements also deal with security of financing for China-Pakistan bilateral cooperation, financial support for upgradation and rehabilitation of Karakorum highway and its improvement project, collaboration between China Northern Industries Corporation and Heavy Engineering Complex as well as China-ZHENHUA Oil Company and Pakistan 's Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources.

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