Foreign Minister Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi
while welcoming the establishment of Asia Cooperation Dialogue (ACD) Permanent
Secretariat in Kuwait on Thursday reiterated Pakistan’s firm belief in ACD’s
founding values and its commitment to ACD’s Vision 2030 and the Ankara
Declaration.
The Foreign Minister expressed these views
while representing Pakistan at the 17th ACD Ministerial meeting held in a
virtual format on 21 January 2021.
He said ACD being a leading platform has
transformed into a robust institutional mechanism for dialogue and discussions
among the member states on issues of mutual interest, a press release issued by
the Ministry of Foreign Affairs here said.
Highlighting the devastating repercussions of
the COVID-19 pandemic on sustainable development and developing countries,
Pakistan stressed the need to coordinate actions, benefit from each other’s
experiences, and pool resources for responding to the pandemic and financing
the implementation of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
The Foreign Minister stated that Pakistan was
open to share its experience and internationally acknowledged approach in
effectively combating the pandemic, and emphasized the need for the COVID-19
vaccine to become easily and equitably accessible to all.
Assuring full support to the ACD’s agenda on
Tourism and Culture, being the Co-prime Mover, Pakistan stated that the theme
“the New Normal and Safe and Healthy Tourism” will help in fostering
networking, improving connectivity, and promoting tourism in the ACD Member
States.
Highlighting the importance of connectivity
and announcing an early convening of the inaugural meeting of the Executive
Committee of the Joint Working Group on Connectivity, Pakistan emphasized the
need to implement the ACD Blueprint 2021-2030 and the Road Map for ACD Regional
Connectivity.
ACD is a continent-wide forum, which provides
a platform to Asian countries to regularly exchange views on areas of mutual
interest and foster an Asian community. Pakistan is one of the founding members
of ACD and assigns high priority to this forum.
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