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ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s Deputy Prime Minister Ishaq Dar on Monday stressed the need for concessional financing and debt relief for developing nations to bridge funding gaps in meeting global sustainable development goals (SDGs).

The comments came during Dar’s address at a debate of the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development’s (HLPF) Ministerial Segment in New York for the follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 SDGs.

The 2025 HLPF is themed around advancing sustainable, inclusive, science- and evidence-based solutions for the 2030 Agenda and its SDGs, including good health and well-being, gender equality, decent work and economic growth.

Speaking at the forum, Dar said only 35 percent of the Agenda 2030 SDGs were on track and the compounding effects of the pandemic, food, fuel and finance crises as well as intensifying climate impacts had reversed the hard-won development gains and deepened inequalities.

“While national efforts are essential, these cannot succeed in isolation,” he said, calling for a “deep reform” of the international financial architecture to implement the SDGs.

“Developing countries need scaled up access to concessional and grant-based resources, meaningful debt relief, and scaled-up climate finance in order to bridge the SDG financing gap.”

The statement comes as Pakistan treads a long path to economic recovery while facing adverse impacts of climate change, with extreme weather events frequently affecting the South Asian country in recent years. So far this monsoon, more than 200 people have lost their lives in Pakistan as heavy rains continue to last parts of the country.

Dar said his country was scaling up climate action, targeting 60 percent renewable energy by 2030, and enhancing resilience through various initiatives.

“Our revised nationally determined contribution is nearing finalization,” he said. “We have also undertaken key macroeconomic reforms to stabilize our fiscal outlook and make the investment climate even more attractive.”

The Pakistani deputy PM said the Compromiso de Seville, a renewed global framework adopted at the Fourth International Conference on Financing for Development this month, offered a clear roadmap to tackle the challenges of financing sustainable development.

The framework focuses on closing the $4 trillion annual financing gap for the SDGs, addressing debt crises, and reforming the international financial system.

“Its implementation must begin without delay,” Dar added.

Dar is on a week-long visit to the United States to preside over the key events in the UN Security Council during Pakistan’s presidency for the month of July, according to the Pakistani foreign office.

He is also scheduled to hold a meeting with UN secretary-general as well as president of the UN General Assembly in New York.

ISLAMABAD: Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Monday condemned ‘honor killing’ of a young couple in Pakistan’s southwestern Balochistan province and called for bringing the perpetrators to justice, following public outrage over a video clip of the incident that has gone viral online since last week.

In the video circulating on social media, more than a dozen men are seen gathered in a remote, mountainous desert area, with SUVs and pickup trucks parked nearby. A woman is ordered to stand facing away from the group before a man pulls out a gun and shoots her in the back. He then turns the weapon on a man and shoots him dead as well. 

Several news outlets reported that the man and woman had just gotten married and were shot dead for marrying by choice upon the orders of a traditional tribal council formed to settle disputes. However, speaking to reporters at a news conference, Balochistan Chief Minister Sarfaraz Bugti said the victims were not husband and wife. 

On Monday, PM Sharif spoke with CM Bugti over the phone and instructed him to hold investigation into the incident and punish those behind the killing in accordance with law, according to the prime minister’s office.

“No one is above the law and no one can be allowed to take the law into their own hands,” Sharif said. “All legal steps should be taken to bring the suspects to justice.”

Meanwhile, a judicial magistrate in Balochistan’s capital of Quetta on Monday ordered the exhumation of the body of the woman, local media reported. Police were still probing suspects to locate body of the slain man. The couple was shot dead in Dagari area on the outskirts of Quetta.

Bugti earlier announced the arrest of 12 suspects in the case, saying a tribal leader was also among the arrestees. He, however, said relatives of neither of the victims had filed a complaint. 

“Not a single person is ready to come forward as a victim in this case or file an FIR [first information report],” he said. 

On Sunday, Balochistan government spokesman Shahid Rind said the incident captured in the viral video had taken place in Balochistan a few weeks ago.

“This area [where the incident took place] has been identified,” Rind said. “Both families did not report the incident. We will have a case registered with the state as complainant.”

So-called honor killings are common in Pakistan, where family members and relatives sometimes kill women and men who don’t follow local traditions and culture or decide to marry of their own choice.

On Sunday, the Pakistan Ulema Council (PUC), a group of clerics and religious scholars, called the couple’s killing “un-Islamic, anti-Sharia and terrorism,” urging the registration of terrorism cases against the ones involved in such incidents.