Prime Minister Muhammad Shehbaz Sharif, accompanied by Federal Minister for Information Technology and Telecommunication Shaza Fatima Khawaja, visited Istanbul to advance bilateral cooperation between Pakistan and Türkiye across information technology, digital transformation, trade, and investment, with the visit producing a series of high-level engagements with Turkish business, technology, and government counterparts.
During the visit, the Prime Minister addressed the Pakistan-Türkiye Business Conference, where he highlighted Pakistan’s growing investment potential across several priority sectors including information technology, Special Economic Zones, energy, and privatisation. The conference brought together senior business leaders and investors from both countries, with the Prime Minister presenting Pakistan’s technology sector growth trajectory, its expanding young workforce, and the structural reforms being advanced under the Special Investment Facilitation Council as reasons for Turkish companies and investors to consider deepening their commercial engagement with Pakistan.
The presence of the IT Minister alongside the Prime Minister gave the visit a strong technology dimension, with Shaza Fatima Khawaja engaging with Turkish counterparts on digital transformation cooperation, technology transfer, and bilateral collaboration in areas where Pakistan is seeking international partnerships to accelerate its own digital infrastructure and capacity development. The visit included a dedicated meeting with Turkcell Chief Executive Officer Ali Taha Koç, during which the Prime Minister invited the company to explore long-term collaboration in 5G deployment, network optimisation, spectrum management, telecom manufacturing, digital infrastructure, and skills development, and proposed the establishment of a Pakistan-Türkiye Digital Corridor to strengthen regional digital connectivity and facilitate secure cross-border data flows.
The Istanbul visit reflects the current administration’s strategy of combining high-level diplomatic engagement with targeted investment outreach, using the Prime Minister’s bilateral meetings to open doors for technology sector partnerships that could translate into capital inflows, skills transfer, and industrial collaboration. Pakistan and Türkiye share a longstanding relationship across diplomatic, cultural, and economic dimensions, and the Istanbul engagements represent an effort to extend that relationship into the technology and digital infrastructure domains where both countries are actively investing as part of their respective economic modernisation programmes.
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