Pakistan PM warns of ‘tough time’ to fulfill IMF conditions

By MUNIR AHMED
Associated Press

ISLAMABAD (AP) — Pakistan’s prime minister has warned of a “tough time” as his government struggles to comply with conditions set by the International Monetary Fund for the next tranche of the country’s bailout package. Shahbaz Sharif addressed on Friday an auditorium of top government and military officials in Peshawar, the capital of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, where a massive suicide bombing at a mosque inside a high security police and government compound on Monday killed 101 people and wounded 225. Sharif says the cash-strapped country’s “economic challenges at the moment are unimaginable.” He spoke just days after IMF officials and Pakistan’s Finance Minister Ishaq Dar resumed talks in the capital, Islamabad, on its bailout.