Prime Minister Imran Khan has accepted the invitation of Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman for participation in the ‘Middle East Green Initiative’, the PM Office said Friday.
Saudi Ambassador Nawaf bin Saeed Ahmad Al-Maliki presented the formal invitation extended by the crown prince to Prime Minister Imran Khan to attend the summit, being hosted by the Kingdom in October.
“The Prime Minister graciously accepted the invitation,” the PM Office confirmed in a statement issued here.
Read more: Pakistan offers support to Saudi Green Initiative
The initiatives of the Saudi Crown Prince, announced earlier this year, align closely with Prime Minister Imran Khan’s climate change initiatives – ‘Clean and Green Pakistan’ and the ‘Ten Billion Tree Tsunami’.
Pakistan and Saudi Arabia are also collaborating closely to develop synergies in their climate-change-related strategies.
Saudi Ambassador presented a formal invitation to the PM @ImranKhanPTI, extended by Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, for participation in a Summit focusing on the “Middle East Green Initiative” to be hosted by the Kingdom in October 2021. PM graciously accepted the invitation. pic.twitter.com/qpLNN003De
— PTI (@PTIofficial) July 30, 2021
“The invitation extended to the Prime Minister is an acknowledgment of Pakistan’s leading role in combating climate change,” the PM Office said.
Saudi Green Initiative
It is worth mentioning that prior to his visit to the Kingdom in May, Prime Minister Imran Khan appreciated various landmark initiatives taken by the visionary leadership of Saudi Arabia. One that requires a special mention was the ‘Saudi Green Initiative’ and ‘Green Middle East Initiative’, he said.
The Prime Minister further added, “We believe that our priorities and goals in this regard are aligned and we can therefore learn a lot by sharing experiences. Pakistan will extend every possible support toward the success of the Green Initiative.”
The initiative calls for partnerships with regional countries to face the environmental challenges in the region, improve the quality of life, and implement the largest afforestation project in the world.
According to international media, the initiatives are set to apply a number of ambitious programs that will reduce carbon emissions by 60 percent in the region and plant 50 billion trees.
The initiative will also work to increase the percentage of protected land to more than 30 percent, exceeding the global target at 17 percent per country. It will reduce carbon emissions by more than 4 percent of global contributions through renewable energy projects that will provide 50 percent of the Kingdom’s electricity production by 2030.
The two initiatives come in support of the existing environmental efforts the Kingdom has supported in previous years as it continues to face its own challenges at home from desertification, low rainfall, and debilitating dust storms, Zawya reported.
APP with additional input by GVS News Desk