Pakistan and China on Tuesday reaffirmed their commitment to strengthening their iron-clad, all-weather strategic cooperative partnership through enhanced collaboration — a reflection of their unique and time-tested bilateral relationship.
This reaffirmation came during a meeting between Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and Chinese President Xi Jinping at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, where both leaders agreed that the Pakistan-China relationship is unparalleled and must be reflected through deeper cooperation.
The two leaders also discussed important regional and global developments and agreed to maintain close coordination on shared challenges and opportunities.
Prime Minister Shehbaz reiterated Pakistan’s commitment to working closely with China to ensure the successful implementation of the next phase of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which includes five new development corridors.
He congratulated President Xi on the successful hosting of the SCO Council of Heads of State summit in Tianjin, and extended felicitations on the 80th anniversary of the World’s Anti-Fascist War.
The prime minister praised President Xi’s visionary and transformational leadership, which he said had inspired China’s continued march toward modernisation.
He highlighted the strategic importance of CPEC as a flagship project of President Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), aimed at fostering a Pakistan-China community with a shared future.
He appreciated China’s unflinching support for Pakistan’s territorial integrity, sovereignty, and socio-economic development, as well as the significance of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor as a flagship project of President Xi’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) to help both countries build an even stronger Pakistan-China community with a shared future.
Commending President Xi’s global vision, the prime minister also lauded China’s commitment to multilateralism and expressed Pakistan’s full support for key initiatives launched by President Xi, including the Global Development Initiative (GDI), Global Security Initiative (GSI), Global Governance Initiative, and Global Civilisation Initiative.
These initiatives would serve the collective global good and contribute to regional as well as global peace, stability and development, he added.
In response, President Xi said that China would continue to assist Pakistan in all areas of economic growth and development, especially as the two countries move into the second phase of CPEC, which would focus on Pakistan’s most important economic sectors.
The prime minister also extended a “most cordial” invitation to President Xi to undertake an official visit to Pakistan in 2026, when the two countries will mark the 75th anniversary of diplomatic relations.
