October 5, 2003	Sunday	Sha’aban 8, 1424

KARACHI, Oct 4: Pakistan has received $128 million from the Asian Development Bank under its Decentralization Support Programme.

The SBP said in a statement that the liquid foreign exchange reserves of the country have shot up to $11.42 billion mainly due to the receipt of this $128 million tranche. The central bank, however, did not say when Pakistan exactly received this money and how much worth of other inflows were seen in the last couple of days.

The SBP statement said out of the $11.42 billion total liquid forex reserves, the State Bank held $10.05 billion and all other banks held $1.37 billion.

Sources close to the SBP say it is not only the $128 million inflow from ADB that has increased the reserves. They say Pakistan has received a substantial amount from the US also.

A senior official of the SBP confirmed to Dawn that $60 million has come from the US as a regular tranche of the money it is paying to Pakistan for the logistic support Islamabad is providing to the US forces in their war against terrorism in this region.

Sources close to the SBP say in addition to this $60m there have been more inflows of foreign exchange primarily from the US but also from other countries.