ISLAMABAD: China’s Ambassador to Pakistan Sun Weidong said on Monday if Iran was to join China Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC) project, it would be beneficial for both countries.
In an interview with IRNA, the Chinese ambassador said his country was looking forward to enhancing its cooperation with Iran through CPEC.
Iran had shown willingness to become part of the CPEC in a meeting between President Hassan Rouhani and Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif in New York on the sidelines of the latest session of the United Nations General Assembly.
Sun Weidong added that China shares very good relations with Iran. “We think that Iran can also be a very important country along the Belt and the Road initiative, so we really look forward to enhance our cooperation with Iran.”
“CPEC is a win-win cooperation so we are looking forward to explore the possibilities of cooperation among the all the regional countries,” said the ambassador.
To a question that CPEC could be an energy line from Iran to China in the future, Weidong said, “We can explore such a possibility.”
There are many projects under the CPEC framework that are being implementing or under construction in Pakistan, said the ambassador.
“There are 16 major projects that are under construction and Chinese side has already invested more than $13 billion,” he added.
The diplomat went on to say that CPEC has created tens of thousands of jobs opportunities in Pakistan, “so we can see that CPEC can bring lot of benefits to Pakistani people”.
China-Pakistan economic corridor (CPEC) is a mega project between the two countries under which China will invest $46 billion in Pakistan.
The economic corridor is about 3,000 kilometres long consisting of highways, railways and pipelines that will connect China’s Xinjiang province to Pakistan’s Gwadar port.
