ISLAMABAD: Pakistan plans to build an interfaith highway by facilitating Hindus and Buddhists who want to visit religious sites significant to their faith after the inauguration of its flagship Kartarpur corridor project this week, said the foreign office spokesman, Dr. Muhammad Faisal, on Thursday while announcing Prime Minister Imran Khan’s agenda to strengthen religious tourism in the country to help its dwindling economy.
A joint initiative of India and Pakistan, the Kartarpur Corridor is designed to connect the Sikh shrines of Dera Baba Nanak Sahib in India’s Punjab province to Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Pakistan’s Kartarpur, a small town located 125 km northwest of Lahore and only four kilometers from the Indian border.
Guru Nanak is the founder of the Sikh faith and Darbar Sahib is his last resting place.
Pakistan will facilitate the visa-free travel of 5,000 pilgrims arriving through the corridor on a daily basis. The visiting Sikhs will be allowed to worship till the complex shuts down at 5 pm in the evening.
During a weekly press briefing centered mostly on the corridor initiative, Faisal said that facilitating Sikh devotees was part of Pakistan’s plan to revive its tourism industry which was neglected in the past decades before it was undermined by a surge of militancy in the region after the 9/11 attacks in the United States.
Highlighting the steps taken by the government to welcome more than 10,000 Sikh pilgrims from around the world, including 5,000 from India, for the corridor’s inauguration by Prime Minister Imran Khan on November 9, the spokesman said the country also wanted to facilitate Hindus and Buddhists to attract more international tourists belonging to different faiths.
“Buddhists are interested in sites reminding them of Lord Buddha” in Pakistan, Faisal said while referring to a recent visit of a 15-member delegation of Monks from Thailand, which was led by The Most Venerable Arayawangso, to Gandhara heritage sites.
In a meeting with the Buddhist delegation, the spokesman added, Foreign Secretary Sohail Mahmood highlighted that the government was “facilitating religious tourism in Pakistan with the common message of peace, harmony and understanding among all religions.”
Expressing his gratitude to the Pakistani official, The Most Venerable Arayawangso hoped that the visit would “encourage tourists from Thailand and other countries to visit Pakistan and study its Buddhist heritage.”
Faisal said: “This government is highly focused on religious tourism and you will also see many other initiatives in the future, which are in the pipeline now, that will support other forms of tourism as well.”
“Tourism will flourish which will enable the country’s economic growth and become its source of income. In many countries, tourism is a primary source of earning and we are beginning to tap into this industry,” he said.
In March this year, Prime Minister Khan had announced a new visa policy to welcome the world in a bid to revive Pakistan’s tourism industry, saying that citizens of 175 countries would be able to apply for online visas, three months after Pakistan said it would offer visas on arrival to visitors from 50 countries.
The latest visa system has produced satisfactory results with “44,705 applications received via Pakistan Online Visa System,” said the interior ministry’s additional secretary and spokesperson, Abdul Aziz Uqaili, while talking to Arab News.
Pakistan eyes religious tourism to revive economy
Pakistan eyes religious tourism to revive economy
- Promoting religious sites of Hindus and Buddhists next on the country’s agenda
- The ruling administration sees tourism as essential for Pakistan’s economic growth
Pakistan highlights economic reforms at Davos, eyes cooperation in AI, IT and minerals
- Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif speaks at breakfast event in Davos at sidelines of World Economic Forum summit
- Pakistan, rich in gold, copper reserves, has sought cooperation with China, US, Gulf countries in its mineral sector
ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif highlighted Pakistan’s recent economic reforms during the sidelines of the ongoing World Economic Forum (WEF) summit in Davos on Wednesday, saying that his country was eyeing greater cooperation in mines and minerals, information technology, cryptocurrency and artificial intelligence with other states.
The Pakistani prime minister was speaking at the Pakistan Pavilion in Davos on the sidelines of the WEF summit at a breakfast event. Sharif arrived in Switzerland on Tuesday to attend the 56th annual meeting of the WEF, which brings together global business leaders, policymakers and politicians to speak on social, economic and political challenges.
Pakistan has recently undertaken several economic reforms, which include removing subsidies on energy and food, privatization of loss-making state-owned enterprises and expanding its tax base. Islamabad took the measures as part of reforms it agreed with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) in exchange for a financial bailout package.
“We are now into mines and minerals business in a big way,” Sharif said at the event. “We have signed agreements with American companies and Chinese companies.”
Islamabad has sought to attract foreign investment in its critical minerals sector in recent months. In April 2025, Pakistan hosted an international minerals summit where top companies and government officials from the US, Saudi Arabia, China, Türkiye, the UK, Azerbaijan, and other nations attended.
Pakistan is rich in gold, copper and lithium reserves as well as other minerals, yet its mineral sector contributes only 3.2 percent to the countrys GDP and 0.1 percent to global exports, according to official figures.
Sharif said Pakistan has been blessed with infinite natural resources which are buried in its mountains in the northern Gilgit-Baltistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Azad Kashmir and southwestern Balochistan regions.
“But we have now decided to go forward at lightning speed,” he said. “And we are also moving speedily in the field of crypto, AI, IT.”
He said the government’s fiscal and economic measures have reduced inflation from nearly 30 percent a few years ago to single-digit figures, adding that its tax-to-GDP ratio had also increased from 9 to 10.5 percent.
The prime minister admitted Pakistan’s exports face different kinds of challenges collectively, saying the country’s social indicators needed to improve.
“But the way forward is very clear: that Pakistan has to have an export-led growth,” he said.
Sharif will take part in an informal meeting of world leaders this year themed ‘The Importance of Dialogue in a Divided Global Landscape,’ his office said in an earlier statement.
Pakistan’s participation at the WEF comes as Islamabad seeks to sustain recent economic stabilization and attract investment by engaging directly with policymakers, business leaders and international institutions at the annual gathering.
