Islamabad, May 15, 2017: Minister for Planning, Development & Reform Professor Ahsan Iqbal has turned down a news story titled “CPEC Master Plan Revealed” dated May 15, 2017 published in Dawn news, saying that the article is completely one sided and factually incorrect, appeared a move to malign CPEC by fanning controversies and promoting fears.

“Dawn should have taken Ministry of Planning, Development & Reform version as a standard journalistic practice. It is absolutely imprudent to misinform citizens by giving extracts and quotes from redundant documents” said Ahsan Iqbal.

He said that China Development Bank (CDB) and National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC) study referred to as Long Term Plan was basically meant for consultations only. “Pakistani side has developed a Transport Monographic Study to complement the CDB and NDRC work. Afterwards, the two sides mutually developed an abridged version, which was shared with all provinces, concerned ministries and departments and their input on LTP was sought”.

Minister Ahsan Iqbal said that input from the stakeholders was incorporated in the Long Term Plan after an extensive consultative process and final version was shared with Cabinet and Prime Minister’s office. Long Term Plan has been approved by the Cabinet and shared with Chinese side for developing a mutual agreement on it.

“I am appalled by Dawn’s article based on working documents to distort final draft taken up with NDRC yesterday in Beijing” Minister remarked.

It may be highlighted that Long Term Plan is not a project document rather it delineates the aspirations of both sides. It is a live document and both sides have an understanding to modify it as per the need besides reviewing it periodically. Any version of Long Term Plan prior to the approved abridged version stands redundant and irrelevant.