Pakistan trade ties with Turkey

President Asif Ali Zardari has emphasised the need for fast tracking the conclusion of Pakistan-Turkey Preferential Trade Agreement and creating facilitative mechanisms for investors and private sectors of the two countries to bolster bilateral trade. He said this during his meeting with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on the sidelines of Eighth D-8 Summit in Islamabad. The Turkish Prime Minister said that Pak-Turkey bilateral relationship would grow with every passing day and touch new heights in near future. The Turkish Prime Minister also held meeting with Pakitan Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf. Both sides discussed matters pertaining to bilateral trade and investment. Prime Minister Raja Pervez Ashraf said trade between Pakistan and Turkey is not commensurate with the ties between the two countries and hoped that the Turkish side will have a favorable look at the tariff structure to improve. The Turkish Prime Minister said his country’s investors were keen to invest in construction of dams in Pakistan. President Asif Ali Zardari opens D-8 Summit on Thursday. Leaders met as Pakistan hosts the summit, which is designed to increase trade and investment. The summit’s goal is to increase the trade between member countries from $130 billion to $507 billion by 2018. Pakistan wants the summit to boost trade and investment, strengthen its international standing and help “remove misconceptions (about Pakistan) created in a section of international media”, a government statement said. Pakistan will also likely press Iran over a multi-billion dollar deal to import Iranian gas despite US pressure to abandon the project because of the sanctions. Meanwhile President Asif Ali Zardari said Pakistan attaches great importance to its relations with Bangladesh and was determined to further strengthen the existing equation extending it to all the areas of mutual interest. This he said during his meeting with a delegation from Bangladesh headed by Dr Syed Ali Gowher Rizvi, Advisor to the Prime Minister on International Affairs in Islamabad. Bilateral relations, mutual co-operation in the area of trade and commerce and overall region situation was discussed during the meeting. Discussing bilateral relations, the President urged the need for the two countries to continue co-operating and co-ordinating with each other at all multilateral forums. The President said that our historical linkages and other commonalities should serve to further strengthen our bilateral relations and help in taking unanimous approach on the issues of mutual concern.