10 February 2020 09:13 am Views - 3443
Pakistani High Commissioner Muhammad Saad Khattak said he wondered as to why Sri Lanka could not become a developed country like Singapore when it had all the necessary assets and a literacy rate as high as 97 percent.
The High Commission organised a seminar titled “Peace and Stability – An Imperative to Prosperity in South Asia” at BMICH Colombo recently. The High Commissioner was addressing the function. He said South Asia was home to 1.8 billion people, and 16.1 percent of them live on less than two US dollars a day.
“This is the state of affairs. All these people deserve an honourable living,” he said. He said there was reference to a fight between two brothers in the region.
“It is the elder twisting the arms of the rest of his brothers. It does not allow any country to exploit its full potential. Why Sri Lanka cannot become Singapore when its literacy rate is 97 percent and has all the assets,” he said.