{"id":111974,"date":"2021-02-23T17:02:51","date_gmt":"2021-02-24T00:02:51","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=111974"},"modified":"2021-02-23T17:02:51","modified_gmt":"2021-02-24T00:02:51","slug":"media-statement-by-prime-minister-mahinda-rajapaksa-during-the-official-visit-by-prime-minister-of-pakistan-imran-khan","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/02\/23\/media-statement-by-prime-minister-mahinda-rajapaksa-during-the-official-visit-by-prime-minister-of-pakistan-imran-khan\/","title":{"rendered":"Media Statement by Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa During the Official Visit by Prime Minister of Pakistan Imran Khan"},"content":{"rendered":"

Prime Minister\u2019s Media Unit<\/strong><\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

Ayubowan!<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I had the great privilege to welcome His Excellency\nImran Khan, the Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, and his\nhigh-level delegation this evening.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Prime Minister, you are not a stranger to the people\nof Sri Lanka. There are millions in this country who have admired your\nleadership on the cricket field as the Captain of the Pakistan National Team.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Your country continues to be a valuable bilateral\npartner, and Sri Lanka considers Pakistan a close and genuine friend. Our\nPeople hold Pakistan in very high esteem. Pakistan was a friend who stood by\nand helped Sri Lanka in times of great need. We are grateful for the steadfast\nsupport, particularly during my Presidency, when we had to fight a dangerous\nterrorist organization that was fully neutralized in May 2009.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

During our bilateral discussions earlier this\nevening, Prime Minister Imran Khan and I agreed to work closely towards\nenhancing our bilateral cooperation in the economic sector and a number of\nother areas including trade, investment, science, technology, defense and\neducation. We also agreed to pursue the opportunities presented within the\nframework of the Pakistan-Sri Lanka Free Trade Agreement. Our talks also\nfocused on important regional and international issues as well as the impact of\nthe Coronavirus pandemic.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We further agreed to work towards increasing\nactivities in the tourism and aviation sectors. Sri Lanka is grateful to\nPakistan for agreeing to open the pilgrimage corridors for Sri Lankans to  visit ancient Buddhist heritage sites in\nPakistan.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another important decision we made is to restart\nParliamentary interaction through the Pakistan<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u2013 Sri Lanka Parliamentary Friendship Groups.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sri Lanka believes that political stability and\nregional peace will be the key to achieve sustainable development, economic\ngrowth and prosperity in South Asia. I admire Prime Minister Khan for his\nefforts in alleviating poverty and socio-economic disparity which play an\nimportant part of our development agenda. We continue to work together to fight\nterrorism, religious fundamentalism and extremism.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In our talks, we agreed to continue with the current\nmechanism to curb illegal drug trafficking, arms smuggling and other illegal\nactivities by sharing information through the relevant agencies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We are also thankful to Pakistan for the partnership\nin the field of sports and assistance to enhance sports training facilities in\nthe country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Tomorrow, Prime Minister Imran Khan will preside\nover a business and investment forum with a strong multi-sector business\ndelegation from Pakistan. Through direct interactions with their Sri<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Lankan counterparts, we expect to see a considerable\nincrease in investments and business activities between our two countries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

While thanking Prime Minister Imran Khan and the\ndelegation for undertaking this official visit to Sri Lanka, I am deeply\ngrateful to you for honoring Sri Lanka with your visit here.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thank you.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Prime Minister\u2019s Media Unit Ayubowan! I had the great privilege to welcome His Excellency Imran Khan, the Prime Minister of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan, and his high-level delegation this evening. Prime Minister, you are not a stranger to the people of Sri Lanka. There are millions in this country who have admired your leadership […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-111974","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111974","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=111974"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/111974\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=111974"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=111974"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=111974"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}