Pakistan must put aside $8 billion for the IMF’s bailout review to be effective.

Despite receiving confirmation from Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) has now asked Pakistan to arrange $8 billion in new loans to support external debt repayments over the next seven months in order to ensure that the long-stalled ninth review bailout package is successfully completed.

Since the latest staff deployment to Pakistan, more than 100 days have elapsed, and a staff-level choice to deliver a $1.1 billion tranche of an IMF loan package has been postponed since November.

IMF allegedly requested Pakistan to set up $8.4 billion in new loans to ensure debt repayments from May to December 2023.