Pakistan last month reached an agreement with the Washington-headquartered International Monetary Fund (IMF) for a $6 billion bailout package aimed at shoring up its finances and strengthening a slowing economy as tries to overcome a ballooning balance-of-payments crisis.
US has communicated its “strong views” on an IMF bailout package to cash-strapped Pakistan and sought “conditionality”, a top State Department official has said, amidst concerns in the Trump administration that the aid could be utilised to pay off the Chinese debts. US has serious reservations over global lenders like the IMF providing a bailout to Pakistan to pay off Chinese debts.
“There is a discussion about the conditionality what we think would be appropriate for an IMF package to Pakistan,” according to senior State Department official (South and Central Asian Affairs) Alice G Wells.
Responding to questions from lawmakers during a Congressional hearing last week, she told House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee for Asia, the Pacific and Nonproliferation that while the US has not seen the IMF package yet, there has been an agreement reached between the IMF and government of Pakistan.
“We have communicated our strong views and Secretary (Mike) Pompeo has also done so publicly on the need for any package to include a real structural reform to reinforce …” Wells said when Congressman Brad Sherman said it looks like that the IMF loan is going through.
US communicates “strong views” on IMF bailout package to cash-strapped Pakistan and sought “conditionality”
