Finance Minister Shaukat Tarin announced on Friday that an agreement had been reached with Saudi Arabia under which Riyadh will give $3.6 billion to purchase crude oil, a day after the government raised all petroleum product prices to a record high.
The finance minister told reporters in Jhelum that Riyadh has agreed to “give cash for the purchase of oil [from another country] as its oil is not being used effectively in our refineries this time around.”
In response to a question in the National Assembly on Wednesday, Tarin revealed that an agreement for another Saudi oil plant had been struck and will be formally announced within two to three days.
“Saudi Arabia would pay $3.6 billion to the government of Pakistan on a monthly basis over a two-year period,” Tarin said during a press conference in Jhelum. He stated that the government will receive $150 million per month to be used solely for oil purchases.
Tarin, who spoke at a press conference alongside Minister of State for Information and Broadcasting Farrukh Habib, said the government was absorbing the impact of the decade’s highest price hike at the international level to provide relief to the people through a variety of measures, including direct food subsidies to the poor.
