KARACHI: Pakistani Finance minister Shaukat Tarin on Wednesday denied the country was opting out of an International Monetary Fund (IMF) program, saying the government had approached the IMF to ask it to ease “tough conditions” on a $6 billion loan.
The International Monetary Fund Executive board approved the three-year loan package for Pakistan in July 2019 to rein in mounting debts and stave off a looming balance of payments crisis, in exchange for tough austerity measures. In March this year, the IMF said after the latest payment, Pakistan had received total disbursements of $2 billion under the Extended Fund Facility.
“If people think we are moving out of the IMF program.. we are not doing this,” newly appointed finance minister Tarin told journalists at a press conference in Islamabad. “We will ask them to give us some space amid the third wave of COVID.”
Tarin said the government had “alternate plans” if the IMF did not respond favorably to the request to relax conditionalities, adding that authorities had held meetings with IMF and World Bank officials on the current state of the economy, and they had been “very sympathetic to our point of view.”
Tarin said the IMF was asking Pakistan to increase power tariffs and impose incremental taxes, which it did not have the “capacity” to do “because our common man is fed up of inflation, which has cascading effects.”
“Tariff increase is not the only way to increase money,” Tarin said. “Prime Minister Imran Khan is not willing to do that.”
Tarin said IMF and World Bank officials had been briefed that revenue generation, which grew by 92 percent prior to the pandemic, had fallen to 57 percent after the outbreak.
The finance minister said the government had alternative plans to bring circular debt in check and stabilize the energy market.
“All their [IMF] interest is that our circular debt is growing, that should be ceased and some stability should be brought in. We will prove to them that the measures we will take will do it.. that will happen,” Train said.
About taxes, the finance minister said the government wanted to enlarge the revenue envelope through innovative means but gradually.
“As they [IMF] said in 2019 to raise [tax collection] directly from Rs 3.8 trillion to Rs 5.5 trillion, that will not happen,” he said, adding: “This is wrong way of doing – we have to increase gradually and in next 7-8 years we will be at the 20 percent … Will bring revenue collection close to their target but not the way they are saying, by ending exemptions etc.”
Pakistan says not opting out of IMF program but won’t raise power tariffs, taxes
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Pakistan says not opting out of IMF program but won’t raise power tariffs, taxes
- Finance minister Tarin said government had approached IMF to ask for more “space” to meet conditionalities on a $6 bln loan
- Says the government has “alternate plans” if the IMF did not respond favorably to the request to relax conditions
Pakistan says nine militants killed in security operations in northwest
- The intelligence-based operations were conducted in Tank and Lakki Marwat districts of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa
- Military says the counterterrorism campaign is being pursued under the framework of the National Action Plan
PESHAWAR: Security forces in Pakistan said on Saturday they killed nine militants belonging to the banned Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) in two intelligence-based operations in the northwestern Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province.
Pakistan refers to fighters of the TTP, an umbrella group of various armed factions, as “khwarij,” a term from early Islamic history used to describe an extremist sect that rebelled against authority. The military also alleges the group receives arms and funding from the Indian government, a charge New Delhi denies.
The two operations were carried out on Dec. 5 in the volatile districts of Tank and Lakki Marwat, according to a statement from the military’s media wing, Inter-Services Public Relations (ISPR).
“On reported presence of khwarij, an intelligence-based operation was conducted by the Security Forces in Tank District,” the statement said. “During the conduct of operation, own troops effectively engaged the khwarij location and after an intense fire exchange, seven khwarij were sent to hell.”
“Another intelligence-based operation was conducted in Lakki Marwat District,” it added. “In ensuing fire exchange, two more khwarij were effectively neutralized by the security forces.”
ISPR said weapons and ammunition were recovered from the militants, whom it described as “Indian sponsored” and accused of involvement in attacks on security personnel, law enforcement agencies and civilians.
It said follow-up “sanitization operations” were under way as part of the country’s counterterrorism campaign under Azm-e-Istehkam, approved by the Federal Apex Committee of the National Action Plan, which aims to eliminate what it called foreign-supported militant threats in the country.
