Deals ranging from energy and infrastructure to education and culture will be signed during Chinese President Xi Jinping’s two-day Pakistan visit that begins on Monday, Xinhua reported on Sunday. This is Xi’s first trip to the South Asian country since he took over as president in 2013. During the visit, China and Pakistan will sign deals on a wide range of issues — from energy and infrastructure to education and culture — which are expected to inject fresh and powerful impetus into the deepening of China-Pakistan friendship and comprehensive cooperation, the report said.
And high on Xi’s agenda would be talks over the China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), which is planned to connect Kashgar in China’s Xinjiang province to the south-western Pakistani port of Gwadar. Gwadar Port is a warm-water, deep-sea port, situated on the Arabian Sea at Gwadar in Balochistan province of Pakistan.
Just outside the Strait of Hormuz, the port is adjacent to the key oil routes in and out of the Persian Gulf. It is also the nearest warm-water seaport to the landlocked but energy rich Central Asian republics. During Chinese Premier li Keqiang’s visit to Pakistan in May 2013, the two countries had agreed on building an economic corridor connecting the Pakistani port to China’s Kashgar city in Xinjiang.
The CPEC will shorten China’s routes of oil and gas imports from Africa and the Middle East by thousands of kilometres, making Gwadar a potentially vital link in China’s supply chain, according to the agency. Khalid Mahmood, president of the Islamabad Council of World Affairs, said the economic corridor can bring in development and prosperity to both the countries.