HYDERABAD, May 14: The Consul-General of Germany in Karachi, Dr Tilo Klinner, said here on Monday that reopening of Nato supply routes is very important for troop withdrawal from Afghanistan and hoped that a solution will be found on mutual and acceptable terms.

“We want to leave Afghanistan as a sustainable country… I am not talking about an ideal situation as it is not easy to achieve but… we should not leave Afghanistan with mess or civil war like in the past when everyone forgot about Afghanistan after the end of cold war. Then the country went through a civil war leading to (rise of) fundamentalism,” he said while talking to journalists at the residence of Dr Irfan Gul Magsi, former Sindh minister.

He said that history shouldn’t repeat itself. “Sometimes we learn lessons”, he said. He said that Germany had a consistent interest in restoring stability in the region.

He discussed Pakistan-Germany trade relations and said that in the last two years trade balance had been in favour of Germany but now it was in favour of Pakistan.

He said that Germany was in favour of duty regime reduction and wanted custom barriers reduced especially when Pakistan achieves GSP (generalised system of preferences) from the European Union.

“Then we will look forward for a sustainable growth in exports of Pakistan to Germany”, Mr Klinner said.

He said that some time was not easy to bring all 27 members of EU into an agreement because Germany has interest in something and another member state is competing for same thing… I think we will succeed in bringing about an agreement,” he remarked.

He said exports from Sindh and Hyderabad to Germany were increasing. He said that there was potential in some areas that have not been exploited. He particularly mentioned agriculture and food.

“When we talk about food, Pakistani mango and seafood quickly come to everyone’s mind,” he said. However, the German diplomat said there is certification problem but it could be resolved and then Germany would be a promising market for these commodities.

“As a whole agriculture produces are not being exported from Pakistan as much as textile and leather products”, the diplomat said. He added it has to do with fact that agriculture market of European Union has some contracts which are not easy to handle because market organisations have special demands. “This is on field we should look at with promised potential in future,” he said.

He mentioned some German initiatives in the field of energy particularly in solar and wind power projects. He added that one initiative that pertains to Thar coal is mainly consultancy-based which may later turns out be an investment initiative.

Earlier, Dr Klinner visited Hyderabad Chamber of Commerce and Industry where he told businessmen that Germany would cooperate and coordinate in arranging visit of a delegation from the chamber to Germany in October and November this year.

Next year Germany would hold trade exhibitions in Karachi and Hyderabad, he said. German firms from Hamburg were desirous to come to Hyderabad to invest in energy sector and to generate energy through coal, he said.

German firms have experience in water conservation and would like to help Pakistan, he said. Germany could help find economic and environment- friendly solutions in field of water conversation, he said.

German firms were interested in investing in wind power generation and initial work on these projects had been completed, the diplomat said.

HCCI president Mr. Goharullah welcomed him and said that Hyderabad had a large number of agricultural-based industries, automobile manufacturing and assembling plants and there was scope of investments in power, coal mining and other agricultural-based industries sector.