Keynote Address by H.E. Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi, Foreign Minister of Pakistan

Islamabad Thursday, February 10, 2022 –  NUST Institute of Policy Studies (NIPS) organized the keynote address of the Foreign Minister, Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi, at NUST, Islamabad on Thursday, February 10. The address focused on highlighting the major contributions of Pakistan’s multidimensional diplomacy to durable peace, inclusive growth, and shared development.

Rector NUST, Lieutenant General (Retd) Javed Mahmood Bukhari HI (M), paid tribute to the Foreign Minister as one of the finest and most experienced statesmen of contemporary Pakistan, under whose stewardship, Pakistan’s diplomacy had been massively revitalized for fostering regional peace, stability, progress, and global harmony.

In his address, the Foreign Minister shared that the collective and consultative pursuit of geoeconomics had grown to become the predominant objective of Pakistan’s foreign policy under the leadership of PM Imran Khan. He stated that this major foreign policy goal was currently being realized through the proactive global operationalization of various types of diplomacy, such as economic diplomacy, public diplomacy, cultural diplomacy, science diplomacy, and digital diplomacy. The address was followed by an extensive interactive session moderated by Director NIPS, Brig (Retd) Amir Yaqub, in which the Foreign Minister responded in detail to various questions and comments from the audience.

The Foreign Minister assured the audience – that consisted largely of the NUST community of students, scholars, and faculty – that Pakistan’s diplomacy was ceaselessly promoting and safeguarding the vital national interests of Pakistan, be it the untiring efforts for a just and satisfactory resolution of Kashmir dispute in line with the UNSC resolutions, the uninterrupted promotion of the comprehensive development of CPEC, the deepening and diversification of diplomatic relations, driving forward both bilateral and multilateral coordination and cooperation with major powers, or Intra-OIC cooperation.

Prof Ashfaque Hasan Khan, Principal NUST School of Social Sciences and Humanities and DG NIPS, presented the vote of thanks, and highlighted the uregent need for the formation of new institutions for conducting new types of regional cooperation and integration.