Financial irregularities totaling Rs98.56 billion have been identified in the Economic Affairs Division for the fiscal year 2023-24, primarily due to the non-recovery of long-outstanding foreign loans, according to a news report.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
The Auditor General has recommended that the government pursue the recovery of these loans through high-level diplomatic and political channels.<\/p>\n
The Audit Report 2024-2025 highlights several significant cases, including the non-recovery of a \u20ac67.646 million (approximately Rs20.57 billion) loan linked to a cement plant project. The loan, originally taken from a French bank in 1994 to set up a plant in Hub, Balochistan, was guaranteed by a Pakistani bank.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Following defaults, Pakistan assumed the debt under a 2001 Paris Club agreement. Despite several efforts, including proposals for asset sales and legal consultations, the amount remains unpaid. The audit stresses that these delays have resulted in a direct loss to the public exchequer.<\/p>\n
The report also highlights the non-recovery of foreign loans worth US$304.5 million (approximately Rs85.26 billion) from countries such as Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Iraq, Sudan, and Guinea-Bissau, which were provided in the 1980s and 1990s under export credit agreements.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Despite repeated follow-ups by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and directions from the Public Accounts Committee, these loans remain unpaid. The audit warns that these defaults are increasing Pakistan\u2019s foreign exchange burden.<\/p>\n
Additional concerns raised in the report include non-production of records, unauthorised expenditures, and weak monitoring of foreign-assisted projects. The Auditor General has called for accountability, legal action where necessary, and improvements in financial oversight within the Economic Affairs Division.<\/p>\n
The report urges the government to strengthen debt management systems, enforce repayment schedules, and conduct regular valuations of debtor companies\u2019 assets to prevent undervaluation losses.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Financial irregularities totaling Rs98.56 billion have been identified in the Economic Affairs Division for the fiscal year 2023-24,…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":66171,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11],"tags":[84,1294,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-66170","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-economy","tag-business","tag-economy","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=66170"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/66170\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/66171"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=66170"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=66170"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=66170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}