Pakistan in Media

In talks with a Pakistan delegation in Washington, the IMF has approved additional financing for Pakistan which has taken the total loan up to US $11.3 billion. The new pledges are intended to bridge any gap that may arise if funds pledged to Pakistan at a donor's conference in Tokyo in April do not come in on time. The immediate problem has thus been resolved; the longer-term crisis grows. The IMF deal of course means Pakistan's debt burden continues to mount. The same holds true in the case of loans taken from other bodies. The situation is largely unsustainable. A glance at the budgetary pie shows how debt eats away at our resources. We simply cannot afford to dish out an ever-increasing slice to it year after year, decade after decade. The crisis Pakistan faces today is largely rooted in its economy. The socio-economic slide over the past decades has contributed to the immense sense of grievance and acted to fuel the militant fires. The rising rate of crime, the growing sense of insecurity, the flight of capital, for which another Forex firm, Zarco, is now being investigated, and the damaging human brain drain are all tied in to this factor.
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The News International, Pakistan, Saturday, July 11, 2009
ISLAMABAD: The ‘tough negotiations’ going on between Pakistan and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) forced the government to hurriedly promulgate the PDL Ordinance to save the $7.6 billion loan programme from falling apart.

Pakistan and the IMF are currently holding talks on the budgetary measures for 2009-10. The suspension of carbon surcharge by the Supreme Court (SC) put the economic team, led by Adviser to the Prime Minister on Finance Shaukat Tarin, in a very “awkward situation”, as they were not in a position to convince the IMF over another revenue shortfall of Rs 122 billion in case the carbon tax was withdrawn.
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