Finance Minister Ishaq Dar met United States’ Ambassador Donald Blome on Wednesday in a bid to get help to revive a stalled IMF program.
Sources said that Dar asked the ambassador to play his role in helping revive the International Monetary Fund’s bailout program, whose latest tranche is pending a staff level agreement.
The current IMF program is rapidly approaching its deadline and the government has been reaching out to foreign countries, particularly the US to find a way to get things back on track.
Faced with dwindling foreign exchanges and the prospect of defaulting on its international payments, Pakistan is looking to get bailed out by the IMF and get aid and loans from ‘friendly’ countries.
The international lender has even asked the government of Pakistan t provide guarantees that it will be able to secure money from friends before releasing its bailout. Meanwhile, Dar has claimed that the government has fulfilled all the conditions of the IMF, including Rs170 billion in new taxes.
