The State Bank of Pakistan (SBP) has confirmed that Pakistan has successfully repaid a total of $3.45 billion in deposits to the United Arab Emirates.
According to the central bank, a $1 billion deposit was returned to the Abu Dhabi Fund for Development on April 23, 2026, while the remaining $2.45 billion had already been repaid earlier in the previous week.
In an official statement shared on X, the SBP said that the repayments mark the completion of all outstanding deposits amounting to $3.45 billion owed to the UAE.
The central bank said “State Bank of Pakistan repaid a deposit of US$1 billion to Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (ADFD) UAE on April 23, 2026. Deposits of $2.45 billion were repaid last week. This completes the repayment of total deposits of $3.45 billion to UAE.”
Finance Minister Muhammad Aurangzeb earlier said that they were considering Eurobonds, loans from other countries and commercial debt to replace the loan facility from the UAE and manage its foreign reserves.
He said that the shock from the ongoing war in the Middle East meant that Pakistan must consider a strategic petroleum reserve and a faster switch to renewable energy.
“All options are on the table,” Aurangzeb said when asked if the government was in talks with Saudi Arabia for a loan that could replace the UAE facility.
Aurangzeb, speaking on the sidelines of the IMF/World Bank annual spring meetings, had said the country could manage all debt repayments, and that its reserves remained at roughly 2.8 months of import cover.
Maintaining at least that level, he said, would be “an important aspect of our overall macro stability as we go forward.”
“We are looking at Eurobond, we are looking at Islamic sukuk, we are looking at dollar-settled rupee-linked bonds,” Aurangzeb had said, adding that they expected to issue Eurobonds this year and are also exploring commercial loans.
He had said while the country had not yet requested any addition or changes to its $7 billion IMF lending programme due to the economic shocks of the war in the Middle East, it was a potential option.
