visit<\/a> to China, PM Shehbaz Sharif met his counterpart, Premier Li Qiang, and attended an investors\u2019 conference.<\/p>\n\n\n\nAccording to the PM Office, PM Shehbaz and his Chinese counterpart reaffirmed to work together in a meeting that the former termed \u201cmost productive\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cBoth sides also agreed to continue working closely on the next phase of upgraded CPEC 2.0, with its five new corridors,\u201d an official statement said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
During the meeting, the prime minister highlighted the \u201csignificant contribution\u201d of the CPEC to Pakistan\u2019s socio-economic development in the past decade. He also stressed the need for early implementation of the Main Line-1 (ML-1) railway project, the Karakoram Highway realignment and operationalisation of the Gw\u00ad\u00adadar Port.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI also invited Chinese companies to enhance their investment footprint in Pakistan,\u201d the PM wrote on X, adding that the leaders\u2019 agreement on adv\u00adancing cooperation in information technology, agriculture, minerals, textiles and industry.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
PM Shehbaz also shared Pakistan\u2019s intent to float Panda Bonds, a type of debt security issued by foreign entities denominated in Chinese yuan (RMB), in the Chinese capital market soon.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He later met Chinese Min\u00adister for Information Techn\u00adology and Industry Li Lecheng and reiterated Pakistan\u2019s vision of deepening bilateral cooperation with China in industries, agriculture, trade, ICT, mining and minerals.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Investors\u2019 conference<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\nBoth countries have also agreed to deepen security and defence cooperation, and will work together to crack down on terrorism, the Xinhua news agency reported, citing a joint action plan agreed by the two countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
PM Shehbaz later termed the security of Chinese businesses \u201cparamount\u201d to Pakistan, inviting investment into the country under the banner of CPEC-2.0.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Addressing Chinese business leaders at the Pak-China B2B conference, PM Shehbaz said, \u201cI want to make it clear before this assembly of great leaders that the security of Chinese brothers and sisters in Pakistan is paramount for all of us.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He invited them to \u201ccome forward and change the landscape of progress and welfare\u201d for both China and Pakistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Noting delays in the formal launch of CPEC-2.0, PM Shehbaz assured the potential investors that \u201cPakistan will not tolerate even a second\u2019s delay\u201d in facilitating Chinese companies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He acknowledged that there were delays, and things had not \u201cmoved forward as per Chinese standards\u201d; however, he stressed that Pakistan\u2019s doors remained open to Chinese investors, adding that \u201cwe will not keep them waiting even for a second\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cI am here speaking to you first as the chief executive officer of Pakistan and then as the prime minister,\u201d he added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The prime minister also held a series of high-level meetings with senior executives of China\u2019s leading enterprises in Beijing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
He also invited Chinese com\u00ad\u00ad\u00adpanies to consider Pak\u00adi\u00adstan as their preferred investment destination, particularly for relocating industries into special economic zones, saying that the country offered a \u201cun\u00ad\u00adique comparative advantage\u201d with a large pool of skilled and cost-effective labour, competitive input costs and strategic connectivity to regional and global markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
After wrapping up his six-day visit, PM Shehbaz subsequently returned to Pakistan on Thursday night.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Published in Dawn, September 5th, 2025<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u2022 Premier meets his counterpart, pledges close coordination on CPEC 2.0\u2022 Reiterates commitment to protecting Chinese citizens, promises \u2018no red tape\u2019 for investors\u2022 Terms skilled workforce a \u2018comparative advantage\u2019 ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and China on Thursday vowed to further cement bilateral trade and strategic ties, as both sides inked 21 different MoUs and joint ventures worth around $8.5 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":3377,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"rop_custom_images_group":[],"rop_custom_messages_group":[],"rop_publish_now":"initial","rop_publish_now_accounts":{"facebook_3859443944190656_828796993651875":""},"rop_publish_now_history":[],"rop_publish_now_status":"pending","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-3391","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-world"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3391"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3391\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3392,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3391\/revisions\/3392"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/3377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/paksouch.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}