ISLAMABAD: Minister of State for Finance and Revenue Hammad Azhar onThursday informed the Senate that the amount if foreign loans againstPakistan stood at $ 88,199 million adding that $ 9.2 billion would beretired this year.
Replying to various questions during Question Hour, the minister said thata sum of $ 37 billion foreign loan would be retired during the next fiveyears.
Giving details, the minister said some $ 3,256.33 million under foreigndebt and $ 1295.21 million interest on loans had been paid back during thecurrent fiscal year till January 31, 2019.
He said the past government during its five years tenure had obtained loanon very short term.
Hammad Azhar said the present government was committed to fully dischargethe debt obligations of the country to its external creditors and a multipronged strategy was being pursued.
The focus was to substantially increase country’s exports and workersremittances and reduce imports, he added.
He expressed the hope that this year, the country would receive $ 22billion remittances from the overseas Pakistani. The country’s export wasalso expected to reach at $ 25 billion during the said period, he added.
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He said the government was also focusing on enhancing domestic revenues,reducing expenditure to bring down budget deficit as well as currentaccount deficit.
To another question, the minister said the process to seek membership ofEgmont Group was initiated on September 21, 2011 after the approval ofFederal Cabinet.
At present, Onsite Assessment Report (OAR) from FinCEN (FIU of USA) andJAFIC (FIU of Japan) was still a waited which described findings of Onsitevisit to Pakistan (January 29, 2018 to February 02, 2018), he said.
He said the government was vigorously following-up to expedite the processof Egmont Group membership. After getting membership of Egmont Group, wewould also get data, he added.
