ISLAMABAD – President Asif Ali Zardari, who left on Sunday for Japan on a three-day visit, will hold talks with the Japanese Prime Minister Naoto Kan to strengthen the cordial relations between the two countries and open new vistas of cooperation.
This will be the president’s second visit to Japan since assuming office. He will also visit the emperor of Japan and hold summit level talks with Prime Minister Naoto Kan, according to an official statement.
The president is also scheduled to meet with Japanese Cabinet members, parliamentarians and leading businessmen. According to statement, the visit will provide an opportunity to the president to brief the Japanese leadership on Pakistan’s views on key international and regional issues as well as discuss ways and means to further expand bilateral political and economic ties.
The visit will also reiterate the importance that Pakistan attaches to its relations with Japan. The president’s meeting with the Japanese businessmen will help project Pakistan as a destination for the Japanese investment. Japan has actively participated in the Friends of Democratic Pakistan Forum (FODP) and hosted the FODP Ministerial and Donors Conference in Tokyo in April 2009. It pledged $1 billion at the Donors Conference in Tokyo.
Japan has also extended assistance for the internally dislocated persons affected in Swat and Malakand. It extended $500 million assistance at the Pakistan Development Forum for the relief and rehabilitation of flood victims. Pakistan’s major exports to Japan are textile and textile articles. Yarn is Pakistan’s major export product to Japan. Pakistan’s major imports from Japan are motor vehicles, their parts and machinery. Power generators and textile machinery constitute the main proportion of machinery import.
Owing to the modernization and the improvement of the production base of the textile industry, Pakistan’s imports of the textile machinery from Japan in 2003 amounted to $117 million as against $20.6 million in 1999, showing an increase by over 5.5 times.
Japan is the fourth largest investment partner of Pakistan with cumulative investment of $385.9 million during the period of 1989-90 to 2003-2004, constituting five percent of the total investment in the country.
