Indonesian Envoy speaks about Pakistan-Indonesia ties

Thank you very much for having me,Pakistan and Indonesia have very solid foundations in terms of bilateral relationship, during last years this relationship in terms of trade has enhanced significantly.

Says Indonesia can serve Pakistan as launching pad to expand its ties with ASEAN

If we look at the trade during last years, it remained focused on very few import and export products on the part of both the sides, so we have to expand it, diversify it because there is a lot of room for expansion.

Terms Pakistan as his second home by saying that both the countries enjoy a number of similarities

On the social-economic side, I think we have also very strong foundations, last year the Pakistani students were the biggest recipients of scholarships provided by the government of Indonesia.

Around 30 to 40 percent of the total, close to four hundred scholarships went to Pakistani students and we hope that this year we can increase the number. You know Pakistani students have a lot of interest in studies in Indonesia.

Encourages Pakistani students to look at Indonesia for studies

Both the countries have a number of similarities , so I would once again encourage Pakistani students to look at Indonesia to study. Indonesia being one of the biggest countries in the region can provide also a good launching pad to Pakistan to expand its relations with ASEAN.

This was stated by the Indonesian Ambassador to Pakistan His Excellency Adam M. Tugio in an exclusive interview to the Gulf Observer.

To another question, the Ambassador said that Pakistan is his second home and that he loves to his second home country, it enjoys a lot of attractions, its business community is aggressively trying to expand its exports to different parts of the world including Indonesia.

Adds both Indonesia and Pakistan can complement each other by working together, establishing joint ventures and can explore markets like Africa, China etc

And we see that Pakistan enjoys strong command in terms of medical equipment, garment industry, leather, these are the areas, I believe have a lot of potential to expand these exports to ASEAN and Indonesia. We also buy garments and agricultural products from Pakistan so I think Pakistan and Indonesia can team up to establish some sort of a collaboration, we can complement each other.

So I think, the room is there, the potential is there, where both Indonesia and Pakistan can complement each other by working together, establishing joint ventures and then we can explore markets like Africa, China etc.