French envoy promises help for Pak textile pacts with EU nations

The French envoy says Pakistan first country to benefit from GSP-Plus scheme

Islamabad: French Ambassador Nicolas Galey said on Saturday that relations between his country and Pakistan were expanding in various fields.

Addressing the media here, he said his country had always supported Islamabad over the issue of its access to European markets, and Pakistan was the first country to benefit from the GSP-Plus facility. He said the GSP-Plus facility was available to only eight nations beyond the European Union countries and Pakistan was among those countries. He said his country would provide all help to Pakistan to exhibit its products in European markets. The envoy said an agreement about Pakistan’s textile products, reached earlier was nearing completion, and a new agreement would be signed in future.

He said his country would support to conclude that agreement with the EU. He promised that his country would extend even more support to Pakistan when new trade agreements would be reached between Islamabad and other nations. To a question about Pak-France relations, he said a good number of Pakistani students were studying on scholarships in his country currently. He said a recent meeting between Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif and French President Emmanuel Macron proved very fruitful. They had earlier met in September 2022 during the UN General Assembly session. The latest meeting in Paris was also a positive meeting, in which bilateral relations came under discussion.

He expressed his satisfaction that Pakistan’s relations with the International Monetary Fund (IMF) had been put in the right direction and the engagement would produce good results in the long term.

He said his country had taken two special initiatives after Pakistan experienced super floods last year. It sent manpower comprising experts for providing help to the flood affected and secondly announced a long-term plan at the Geneva convention.