TEHRAN -- Pakistani Ambassador Muhammad Bux Abbasi says that the Economic Cooperation Organization is close to achieving the objectives that the European Union was only able to accomplish after 20 years.

On Saturday, the Tehran Times conducted an exclusive interview with Pakistan’s ambassador to Iran in his office at the Embassy of Pakistan in Tehran in which he called the recent ECO summit a very well-organized and impressive event that resolved many issues which will help boost economic activities in the region.
At the 10th ECO summit, which was held in Tehran on March 11, 2009, member states expressed their commitment to establish a free trade area by 2015 and to set up an ECO trade and development bank.
Delegations from ECO member states Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Pakistan, Tajikistan, Turkey, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan, and non-ECO countries Qatar, Iraq, and Syria attended the meeting.
Following is the text of the interview with Ambassador Abbasi:
Q: How was the ECO summit?
A: The ECO summit was very impressive, very well organized. And this time, the Economic Cooperation Organization has been exposed to most challenging aspects of economic, social, and physical intervention. And also many issues have been resolved which are going to give a boost to the whole region. The most important are those of the rail links between ECO countries, the ECO bank, which will be established in Istanbul, and highways between ECO countries, visa concessions to the ECO countries, and social intervention between ECO countries. The way ECO is proceeding, inshallah, I think we’ll be very close to achieving those objectives which the European Union has achieved after 20 years -- we’ll achieve them in a much shorter time.
Q: Pakistani President Asif Ali Zardari made his first visit to Iran from March 10 to 11, met the Iranian leadership, and attended the ECO summit. What are your views on the trip?
A: This was a long-awaited visit of Pakistan’s head of state. And President Asif Ali Zardari was looking for some important occasion (to visit Iran) but he would still like to come back, probably in June, to sort out many important bilateral issues. But again, this visit, this short visit, was primarily for the ECO summit, but will be utilized for goodwill and to open up many important things which were pending for a long time.
Q: The trade volume between Iran and Pakistan is extremely low, some $400 million annually. On the other hand, the trade volume between Iran and Turkmenistan and between Turkey and Iran is over three billion dollars each. What’s your take on that?
A: Yes, many people do not understand it very well. The reason for it is because… in the figures of Iran’s trade with Turkey, Turkmenistan, or some other countries, eighty percent of it’s crude oil or gas. But the non-oil-gas trade between these countries is less than one billion dollars or sometimes two billion dollars. Pakistan has also started to obtain crude oil from Iran, and now we are going to sign the (Iran-Pakistan-India) gas pipeline (deal). Then we’ll also cross the multi-billion-dollar figure, inshallah.
Q: Pakistani banks do not accept Letters of Credit (L/C) from Iranian banks. You recently met some of Iran’s senior economic officials to discuss this issue. What was the outcome of the talks?
A: This is a very very crucial issue. That’s why we are handicapped in our trade relations with Iran. The problem is because of the United States’ and the United Nations sanctions against Iran. But we are looking for a medium and may probably be able to open an (Iranian) commercial bank (branch) in Pakistan as well as a (Pakistani bank branch) in Iran to solve the issue.