"Foreign Minister Wang Yi said Pakistan can to airlift the medicines," FM Qureshi said while addressing media in Islamabad earlier today (Thursday).
The development comes a day after Dr Faisal Sultan, Special Assistant to the Prime Minister (SAPM) for Health, stated that by March the government would procure at least one million doses of the Covid-19 jabs.
Taking to Twitter, Foreign Minister Qureshi announced: "With encouraging results of Chinese vaccine and our historic relationship, Pakistan has approved emergency use authorisation of SinoPharm.”
During the two diplomats' telephone conversation, Qureshi said he informed his China’s Foreign Minister that because of its large population, Pakistan needed 1.1 million vaccine doses.
”The Chinese side also promised to make available the required quantity of the medicine by the end of next month [February].”
According to Qureshi China has also agreed to start manufacturing the Covid vaccine in Pakistan.
As a goodwill gesture, the first cache of the vaccine from China will be given free of cost to Pakistan.