Pakistani envoy hails ‘transformative’ 2025 for Pak-US ties, aims higher in 2026

• Ambassador Rizwan Saeed Sheikh extends New Year greetings to Pakistani-Americans
• Says 2025 marked positive momentum in eight decades of bilateral relations
• Says cooperation continues in counter-terrorism, health, and education sectors, identifying new avenues: IT, minerals, energy, tourism, and hospitality

WASHINGTON: Pakistani Ambassador to the United States Rizwan Saeed Sheikh on Thursday described 2025 as a “transformative” year for Pakistan-US relations and expressed hope that bilateral ties will be further strengthened in 2026.

In his New Year message, he extended greetings to Pakistani-Americans and the entire American nation, highlighting the positive momentum in the decades-long partnership.

“I wish the Pakistani-Americans, the entire American nation, a happy new year 2026,” Ambassador Sheikh said, adding that bilateral relations are set to make “further strides.”

“2025 was a year that carried a transformative tenor for Pak-US relations. We saw, witnessed, and lived with a positive momentum in our bilateral relationship spanning almost eight decades,” he noted.

The ambassador highlighted that cooperation continued across existing domains such as counter-terrorism, health, and education, while new areas were identified to transform the longstanding relationship into a strategic, long-term partnership anchored in economic ties.

“We identified IT, minerals, energy, hospitality, tourism, and other avenues as new areas of mutually rewarding, beneficial engagement for both countries that should survive the test of time,” he said, adding that frequent leadership-level meetings helped advance these goals.

Ambassador Sheikh emphasized the need for expanded people-to-people contacts and more enduring business relationships. “While we identified new areas and avenues of cooperation in 2025, and we are celebrating them at the end of this year, we now need to move towards calibrations and deliberations to transform these ideas into concrete actions,” he concluded.