Singapore plans to launch free trade talks with Pakistan, Sri Lanka and Bahrain, Minister for Trade and Industry George Yeo said on Monday.
The trade-dependent city state is already negotiating free trade agreements (FTAs) with South Korea, Mexico, Canada and India, and will begin free trade talks with China in November.
"We are expanding our links beyond India to the whole South Asian region," Yeo told a gathering of economists and business people, adding that free trade agreement talks would be started with Pakistan and Sri Lanka soon.
Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong recently visited those two countries and Bangladesh.
The city state was eyeing the Middle East, which represents a sizeable market of 400 million people and a combined gross domestic product of more than $1 trillion, Yeo said.
Singapore wrapped up free trade talks with Jordan last month, the first trade pact between a Southeast Asian nation and a country in the Middle East.
Trade talks with Bahrain were in the pipeline, and Singapore was exploring FTA possibilities with Egypt, Qatar and Oman as well as partnership opportunities with Saudi Arabia, Yeo added.
"We are strengthening our links to the UAE (United Arab Emirates) and Kuwait. All this will encourage more Middle Easterners to come to Singapore for their holidays, for healthcare and for financial service," he noted.
Yeo added the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS), the central bank, was also keen to promote the development of Islamic financial services in the city state.
Singapore currently has free trade pacts with the United States, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, Jordan and the European Free Trade Association, which groups Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Liechtenstein.
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