Daily Times

Minister of Finance and Revenue Senator Ishaq Dar Saturday ruled out any prospects of Pakistan being on verge of default over its international payments and reiterated that it would will never come close to it as it was committed to making all its payments on time without any delay.

In a video massage, he strongly rejected the baseless and irresponsible statements and rumors about the country’s economy, saying that the government had arranged all international payments for the next one year.

The Finance Minister said that for the past few days, baseless and irresponsible rumors had been circulating about the country’s economy just for the political objectives.

When these rumors were spread through social media and various sources, it not only affected Pakistan’s economy and economic interests, but also impacted the affairs and transactions with their bilateral and multilateral partners, he opined.

The Finance Minister said that rumors were being spread that Pakistan would not be able to pay $1 billion sovereign bond (sukuk) in December. “This is baseless and contrary to facts, Pakistan has never defaulted on its international payments and will never come close to it,” he maintained.

Rumors are also being spread about Pakistan’s credit default swap, he said, adding that they had their own ambitions and formula with regard to credit default swap, this was a baseless thing and the speculations in this regard should be stopped.

The Finance Minister said that rumors were making rounds about the petroleum products which were also fake.

Pakistan has reserves of petroleum products according to the country’s need and demand and there is no need for worry, he added.

Apart from disturbing the public, such rumors also created concern in the financial and international institutions and they sent questions, which not only harmed the efforts for economic interests but also wasted time, he further said.

Ishaq Dar said that there were still rumors about the current account deficit. The current accounts are being closely monitored, professionally managed and well managed, he told and added that the current account deficit was $316 million in September, which was expected to be $400 million in October.

“That is, by the end of the financial year, the current account deficit is likely to be 5 to 6 billion dollars, while the target of this deficit for the current financial year is 12 billion dollars. The current account deficit is expected to remain below target,” he added.

The Finance Minister said that in the light of these facts, he appealed to all Pakistanis not to pay heed to any kind of rumors, as they accorded top priority to Pakistan and for the country’s economy, they needed to work beyond political affiliations.