Khawaja Asif: Amidst the rising tensions and uncertainties in the region, Pakistan’s Minister of Defence Khawaja Asif has announced that he is ‘optimistic’ the country could soon phase out IMF support completely, attributing the surge in military orders to the India Pakistan conflict of May 2025. Asif mentioned in an interview with Karachi based Geo News that the field tested JF-17 Thunder has managed to captivate a fair share of the international defense market and the anticipated orders would yield enough income to wean off the IMF within six months. Aiming to annex more arms markets, Pakistan has already been in informal talks with the likes of Saudi Arabia and Bangladesh about the sale of JF-17 planes.
What Did Pakistan Minister Khawaja Asif Say?
The defense minister has dubbed the recent increase in orders a ‘blessing’ attributing it completely to the performance of Pakistan in the India standoff which he said has led to the global demand for Pakistan’s military hardware rising. He further explained that if these orders were to come through then Pakistan might ‘with folded hands… apologise’ to the IMF and be able to operate without its backing, which would be a huge change in the country’s history of depending on IMF for bailouts. Asif further mentioned discussing with Bangladesh regarding JF-17 and trainer aircraft procurement, and talks with Saudi Arabia possibly converting existing loans into the purchase of jets as a move aimed at strengthening both defence collaboration and economic inflows.
Pakistan Still Under A $7 billion IMF programme
Surprisingly, however, analysts are not as moved by the Defence Ministry’s cheerfulness as the latter would expect. On the one hand, the defence ministry is making high profile claims, whereas on the other hand, Pakistan is still under a $7 billion IMF programme that imposes structural reforms and fiscal discipline according to different reports. Much of the defence export rhetoric is still dependent on deals that are yet to be finalised and paid for, and critics are arguing that the ongoing public debt issues and the dependence on IMF linked budget conditions in Pakistan are far from being resolved. The government’s narrative of emerging independence from multilateral aid has met with scepticism outside official circles owing to the still fragile economic stability.
