China's overland Silk Road and Maritime Silk Road Thread
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Indus Highway N-55 section 25 km Fazil Pur- Tuansa -D I Khan with 6 bridges awarded to M/s NCC IKAN HRPL(JV).
PACKAGE-6R: EHABILITATIOONF NATIONALH IGHWAYS& BRIDGES
FAZTLPU-R D .T.KHA(NN -55)
Lot-1 Fazilpu- Taunsa (Km 6 40+00 to 806+000 9 .67 Km incl 3 New Bridges)
Lot-2 Taunsa Ramak (Km 8 06+00 to 862+000(3) .3 Km incl 3 New Bridges)
Lot-3 Ramak D.l.Khan Km 8 72+00 to 932+00(13 Km)
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Pakistan’s second Liquefied Natural Gas (LNG) terminal inaugurated at Port Qasim in .
The new terminal had been constructed in just 330 days. Its third LNG terminal at Port Qasim will become operational in 2018, taking the total installed capacity close to 2,000 million cubic feet per day.
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No other Country maybe able to join before 2020 Pakistan China agree.
Islamabad and Beijing are unlikely to welcome other countries to become part of the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) before 2020 as they will wait until energy and industrial projects are completed, say officials.
Pakistan and China are developing energy projects of $35 billion under CPEC and want to complete them first before opening the door to Middle Eastern states, Iran and Central Asian countries for joining the gigantic economic corridor.
Some of the power projects like Sahiwal coal power plant have been completed and some others are expected to be ready next year.
According to officials, Pakistan has not officially invited these countries in writing to join CPEC as Islamabad and Beijing have agreed, in principle, that they will not make other countries part of CPEC till 2020.
Apart from energy projects, China is also working on communications and industrial schemes. It is also interested in investing in duty-free zones along the economic corridor in Pakistan.
Under CPEC, 37 duty-free zones will be built, of which Pakistan has prioritised nine zones that will be offered to China.
During the visit of a Chinese delegation, a meeting was held in this regard with officials of Pakistan’s Board of Investment (BOI), Petroleum and Water and Power Divisions.
In the meeting with BOI, the Chinese delegates sought some more incentives from Pakistan. They also demanded pieces of land on a 99-year lease, which surprised many Pakistani officials.
‘Gilgit-Baltistan has central importance in reference to CPEC’
They cited the example of Cambodia and Belarus that had given land on lease for 99 years, saying Pakistan should follow that model. However, Pakistani officials did not respond, saying only that it would trigger a wave of criticism in the country.
Following the discussions, expert groups were formed to assess China’s demand and work on the duty-free zones.
Officials disclosed that China could take control of one out of nine prioritised zones on an experimental basis where it would work either independently or enter into joint ventures with the private sector.
They said China wanted complete control over these projects and did not want other countries to join CPEC.
China desires to develop the industry itself in Pakistan and will give CPEC access to other countries when industrial units start working. This will help China to export its projects to other countries like Central Asian states and Russia.
‘CPEC changing country’s’
In the meeting with officials of the Petroleum Division, the Chinese side was informed that not a single project of the oil and gas sector had been made part of CPEC.
The Petroleum Division officials said the oil and gas industry had been ignored in CPEC as the entire focus of China was on electricity, road and railway schemes. Some oil and gas projects should be included in the economic corridor, they emphasized.
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Trump's new Afghan strategy is actually a ploy against , claims Russian journalist....
The recently-unveiled Afghan strategy that President Donald Trump has announced is a ploy against the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), a Russian political analyst and journalist has claimed.
In an opinion piece for Global Village Space, an online forum, Andrew Korybko argues that Trump’s new Afghan strategy is much wider than just Afghanistan. It “includes components of a reworked approach to South Asia as a whole”.
The US president had earlier this week backtracked from his earlier position of pulling out of Afghanistan and cleared the way for more American troops on the ground in the war-torn country. Although Trump didn’t specify any figure, official announcements came from the White House that it had been agreed that up to 4,000 more troops would be deployed.
“The deployment of more soldiers is supposed to be a force-multiplier that’s anticipated to provide valuable back-end military assistance to the Afghan National Army, as Trump made it clear that the entire process from now on must be Afghan-led, including the political one,” wrote Korybko, who works for Russia’s Sputnik news agency.
Trump had also criticised Pakistan saying it was “harbouring terrorists” that the US was fighting.
The Russian journalist, however, termed the US president’s rhetoric a means of putting pressure on Pakistan.
“Trump decided to harshly criticise Pakistan and put pressure on it by using the old and discredited trope that it’s a haven for “terrorists” and uncooperative in fighting against this menace,” the journalist wrote.
Korybko argued that more than 70,000 Pakistanis had died during the years-long war on terrorism and that Operation Zarb-e-Azb, launched by former military chief Raheel Sharif’ was “the first time that a country had ever liberated all of its lands from “territorial terrorists” of the Daesh type, let alone without any foreign assistance.”
He added that it was ironic that Trump had requested for more Indian assistance in Afghanistan considering that Pakistan regularly accuses India of providing support to the Afghan-based terrorists who carry attacks out on its soil.
“This accusation is also backed up by the confession of arrested Indian Hybrid War operative Kulbhushan Jhadav,” he stated.
The Russian journalist went on to add that Trump’s Afghan strategy is less about changing any of the battlefield dynamics there and more about formalising the US’ pivot from Pakistan to India.
“What Trump really wants to do is put multi-pronged pressure on Pakistan as part of the Hybrid War on CPEC through the American-backed strategic interlinking of its Afghan and Indian neighbours,” he concluded. “With the goal being to influence, disrupt, and then ultimately control China’s game-changing corridor to the Indian Ocean through state and non-state proxy warfare.”
