[Arab World] Pakistan’s Army Chief fails to secure meeting with Saudi Crown Prince

In an effort to pacify an angry Saudi leadership, Pakistan’s Army Chief General Qamar Javed Bajwa flew in to Riyadh, however, Saudi Arabia doesn’t seem to be in a mood to mend ties with Pakistan as Bajwa failed to secure a meeting with Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman.

Bajwa along with the head of the Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), General Faiz Hameed, arrived in Saudi Arabia amid strained ties between the two countries. Though Bajwa met Saudi Arabia’s Deputy Defence Minister Prince Khalid bin Salman and Saudi Arabia’s military chief of staff General Fayyad bin Hamid Al-Ruwaili, he failed to meet the crown prince.

The friendship between both countries took a sharp turn when Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi issued a warning to Saudi Arabia after the latter refused to act against India over Kashmir issue.

On the first anniversary of revocation of Article 370 by India on August 5, Qureshi lashed out at Saudi Arabia for not obliging Pakistan over the issue of ‘organising’ a meeting of the Council of Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) Foreign Ministers (CFM) on Kashmir in early February 2020.

Qureshi’s remarks angered Riyadh, who then forced Pakistan to pay back USD 1bn prematurely and is demanding another USD 1bn of the loan.

Pakistan was reportedly paying 3.2 per cent interest on the loan and it has now arranged USD 1 billion loan from State Administration Foreign Exchange (SAFE) of China at London Interbank Offered Rate (LIBOR) plus 1 per cent, which at current rates comes to around 1.18 per cent. Pakistan may have to arrange similar easy loans to pay up the rest USD 2 billion to Saudi Arabia.

Riyadh has helped Islamabad many times including helping in paying for Pakistan’s first batch of F-16 fighter aircraft in the 1980s.

Saudi Arabia had come to Pakistan’s rescue in 2018 when it had agreed to provide $3.2 billion worth of oil on deferred payments per annum as part of its $ 6.2 billion packages to help Pakistan tide over its balance of payment crisis.

The balance $3 billion was delivered as a cash-loan. Saudis had activated the deferred payment facility for three years from 1 July 2019, and the agreement signed in May had come up for renewal this year.

However, the Saudis, visibly upset at Pakistan’s behaviour, have possibly discontinued the arrangement. Pakistan’s tilt towards Turkey, Malaysia, and Iran, as also its growing economic and strategic dependence on China might have annoyed the Saudis.