ISLAMABAD, Aug 11: The United States has urged Pakistan to achieve political stability, ensure rule of law and promote transparency for consolidating political and economic relations between the two countries.

“Political stability, rule of law and transparency are some of the highest level concerns of the United States which need to be addressed particularly for ensuring substantial American investment in Pakistan,” said a senior US State Department official.

Addressing a news conference on Friday, the United States’ Ambassador at large for the Bureau of Economic and Business Affairs, David A. Gross, however noted that a lot of progress had been made in strengthening bilateral relations between the two countries.

Pakistan, he said, was playing a key role in the war on terror and had made huge sacrifices to get hold of terrorists.

He said that although negative travel advisories were still being issued by the US government, American investors and travellers were not hesitating to visit Pakistan.

A lot of new opportunities, the US official said, had been provided by the Pakistan government to attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI).

Pakistan, he said, had open up its economy and pursed a policy of deregulation and privatisation which helped it to promote foreign investment in the country.

He said he has discussed with Pakistani officials matters concerning capacity building with a view to encourage US companies to make new investment in the country. “We will provide new technologies particularly for software development in Pakistan,” Mr Gross said.

He said that Pakistan and the United States have sorted out most of the issues to sign the Bilateral Investment Treaty (BIT) in the near future. “A couple of issues are left which are being deliberated upon by both the sides and the treaty can now be concluded in near future,” he said, adding that there were some technical issues involving arbitration provisions which were being resolved.

He said that the US government was waiting for Pakistan’s response on some technical issues.

The US State Department official also said that Pakistan has emerged as one of the fastest growing telecom markets, which was attracting substantial local and foreign investment.