Islamabad

- Pakistan is facing pressure during its negotiations to obtain a loan from the International Monetary Fund, as the Fund stipulated that it review energy agreements with China within the joint economic corridor between the two countries, which raises doubts about the efforts of this international financial institution to block the corridor with all its components.

The Fund believes that Chinese stations are not treated the same as local stations, and that they require many costs due to difficult conditions set by the Chinese, which makes the cost of electricity from Chinese stations very large for Pakistan.

A strategic corridor that Islamabad relies on a lot

The China-Pakistan Joint Economic Corridor is a joint initiative between the two countries, and it is a major part of the Chinese Belt and Road Initiative, which has been at the top of the Chinese leadership's concerns since 2013. The project began in 2015, at a cost of $46 billion, according to Pakistani government websites, but with progress in the project The cumulative value of the project has ballooned to $62 billion.

The project extends 2,700 km from the city of Kashgar in western China to the port of Gwadar on the southwestern coast of the Pakistani province of Balochistan.

It is planned that the economic corridor will be completed by 2030, providing 700,000 job opportunities in various fields.

The project is divided into several phases, and the first phase of it has been completed and is related to the development of road infrastructure and the development of the energy sector, in addition to starting the development of Gwadar port. Approximately $24 billion has been spent on this phase, which represents 40% of the corridor project, according to This was reported by the Pakistani website (The Digital Dispatch) on June 11.

Pakistan is counting on the corridor a lot to improve the economy, develop the dilapidated infrastructure, and have a role in employing a large number of Pakistanis and operating a number of fields, the most important of which is the development of the energy field, as the agreement aims to develop it at a value of approximately $33 billion.

In addition to projects to lay pipelines to transport natural gas and oil between the two countries, with the participation of Iran.

From a broader perspective, the Belt and Road Initiative is very important in the context of China's trade and economic expansion, in addition to its importance at the geopolitical level, as the initiative represents a tool for linking between China and Central Asia, Pakistan, Afghanistan and Iran to the Arab Gulf, in addition to its access to Africa and Europe.

Speaking of the economic corridor, it is considered the "crown jewel" for the Chinese initiative, as it is the most important way to reach the Arabian Sea.

Aqil Nadim: America and international parties such as the IMF believe that agreements with China are unfair (Al-Jazeera)

difficult conditions

On the conditions imposed by the International Monetary Fund, the former Pakistani diplomat and expert on Asia, Aqil Nadeem, says that the United States and international parties such as the International Monetary Fund believe that these agreements with China are unfair and are in the interest of China, and they believe that there are some secret points And hidden in the agreement.

Nadim adds, in an exclusive interview with Al-Jazeera Net, that these parties have not yet understood that China has stood by Pakistan at a time when international creditors have abandoned its assistance in solving energy problems.

For his part, an expert in political economy and head of the Asian Research Institute for Civilization and Development in Islamabad, Shakeel Ramai, says in an interview with Al Jazeera Net that the reasons in themselves are political, stemming from the rejection of the United States - which has influence on the Fund - for the economic and strategic partnership between China and Pakistan. Therefore, it is constantly putting pressure on Pakistan.

While journalist and political analyst Javed Rana believes that the conditions of the fund are logical to some extent, but at the same time they are based on political backgrounds related to Western competition with China.

The conditions of the International Monetary Fund raise to Pakistan questions about what the Fund can offer to compensate Pakistan for canceling its partnership with China. The West has no plans to help Pakistan develop its economy and infrastructure.

This is confirmed by Shakeel Ramai, who says that the IMF has nothing to offer.

He adds that the United States invented the Group of Seven (G7) as an alternative to the Belt and Road Initiative, but again, they do not have sufficient resources for this, and therefore, practically cannot offer any alternative.

It is clear from this - according to the views of Pakistani analysts - that the price that Pakistan will pay as a result of this will be the loss of Chinese projects that have developed the field of energy and infrastructure to a large extent in the country.

Pakistan seeks a new loan from the IMF (Reuters)

Pakistan..between the IMF and China

Javed Rana believes that Pakistan should review its agreements with China - and Pakistan wants this - because the agreements over the next 40 years do not provide Pakistan with much benefits.

For example, 90% of the revenue from Gwadar port will go to China.

In an interview with Al Jazeera, Rana adds that China must accept renegotiation, and believes that the relations between Islamabad and Beijing are very strong, in addition to Pakistan's strategic importance to China, and therefore China will not control Pakistani assets as it did in Sri Lanka.

Aqil Nadeem agrees, who says that China will be open to renegotiating with Pakistan, and this may have been consulted during the visit of Pakistan Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa to Beijing last week, and the former diplomat believes that China will at least accept a debt repayment delay for several In the coming years, in addition to talks with China to provide a loan of $ 2.8 billion.

Nadeem adds that there is a perception in Pakistan that the national interest of Pakistan must be pursued, and this puts us in a difficult balancing stage between China and the West.

The national interest requires maintaining strategic relations with China, good relations and cooperation with the West, and this requires addressing the concerns of both parties.

Shaquille Ramai complies with this.

But he expected that the review of the agreements between China and Pakistan will not occur, and that the agreements will continue between the two parties as they are.

He says that Pakistan is clear about the necessity and importance of the corridor for it because it is a comprehensive programme.

On the pressures on Pakistan, Ramai said that since the establishment of the idea of ​​the corridor and the signing of the agreement between Pakistan and China, this has not been welcomed by the United States and the West, and they conveyed this to Pakistan at the highest level.

He referred to the diversity of pressures that Pakistan has been subjected to, between rumors and direct pressures, and its inclusion on the gray list of countries supporting terrorism and money laundering, and finally through pressures through the International Monetary Fund.

China and Pakistan..strong relations

It is noteworthy that Pakistan was the first Islamic country and the third non-communist country to recognize China in 1950, in addition to being the second in South Asia, and the fourth in the world to establish official diplomatic relations with China in 1951.

Although there were differences over the border divisions left by British colonialism in the region, Pakistan and China signed a border agreement in 1963 through peaceful negotiations.

Pakistan was a mediator between China and the United States during the visit of US President Richard Nixon to China in 1970.

The strength of relations was demonstrated in the Chinese support for Pakistan in its wars with India in 1965 and 1971, in addition to its support in building the nuclear program, which became a reality in 1998. The economic corridor once again establishes a new reality in the relations between the two countries, and outlines the features of a comprehensive partnership in the long term, where China remains the largest investor in Pakistan.

There have been many trade and economic agreements between the two countries, the most prominent of which was the Free Trade Agreement (first phase) in 2006, which led to the strengthening of trade exchange between the two countries.

In 2015, the two countries celebrated it as the year of friendly exchanges, and the volume of trade exchange between them reached 16 billion dollars at the time.

In 2018, a Free Trade Agreement (Phase Two) was signed.

In 2021, the volume of trade exchange between the two countries amounted to $27.82 billion, according to what the Pakistani newspaper, Dawn, reported last January from the General Administration of Customs in China.

The relations between the two countries at the military level are no less than the economic and political ones, in 1999 the contract for the joint development and production of the “JF-17” aircraft was signed, which is a prominent event in the Pakistani defense industry, one year after the first Pakistani nuclear test. Pakistan's largest military ally.