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Friday, October 15, 2010
Pakistan must tax rich: Clinton
* US secretary of state says Pakistan’s wealthy need to dig into their own pockets to match international efforts for rehabilitation of millions of flood-affected people
BRUSSELS: US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton on Thursday said Pakistan’s wealthy needed to dig into their own pockets to match international efforts to aid the ravaged nation’s long-term recovery.
“It’s absolutely unacceptable for those with means in Pakistan not to be doing their fair share to help their own people while taxpayers in Europe, the US and other contributing countries are all chipping in,” Clinton said.
“The most important step Pakistan can take is to pass meaningful reforms to expand its tax base,” she said as she joined EU foreign policy chief Catherine Ashton in pledging continued assistance. “The government must require that the economically affluent and elite support the government and people of Pakistan,” added Clinton, who has repeatedly insisted on the need for fiscal reforms in Pakistan.
Tax, however, was not among a myriad of questions put to Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi during a 90-minute grilling before the European Parliament’s Foreign Affairs Committee. Qureshi, asked to answer questions ranging from the use of flood aid to empowering women and Pakistan’s nuclear intentions, was in Brussels ahead of a key meeting Friday that he co-hosts with Ashton.
The ministerial-level session of the Friends of Democratic Pakistan is to look at the impact of this summer’s devastating floods on Pakistan’s long-term recovery efforts. Clinton, in the EU capital for a one-day NATO summit, said that as Pakistan shifted from relief to recovery from the disaster that impacted 21 million people – with 12 million in need of emergency help according to the UN – more help would be needed from the international community.
To date the US and the EU have provided around $450 million each in aid. Europe for its part this month also offered a major trade boost, proposing to lift duties on 75 imports as part of an aid-linked package. The three-year suspension of duties still requires a waiver from the World Trade Organisation as well as a green light from the European Parliament. Calling for further support from Europe at the 27-nation bloc’s parliament, Qureshi hammered home a message that Islamabad’s fledgling democracy was on the march after ending a decade of military rule in 2008.
“We are building a democratic culture,” said Qureshi in response to queries on the current role of the military and the power of civilian authorities. afp
Courtesy www.dailytimes.com.pk