Pakistan's Prime Minister Imran Khan on Sunday posted an appeal on social media in the form of a video message, urging the international community, the United Nations Security General (UNSG), and the international financial institutions to help the developing nations in their fight against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, which is spreading like wildfire across the world.

Khan said that the global community should "respond positively to the dilemma confronting the developing countries in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic", urging that a 'debt relief' programme for these countries should be taken up as a global initiative.

"As we see the global response to this crisis unfold, we see two different responses -- one in the developing world, and one in the developed world," the Pakistani Prime Minister said, "While in the developed world, the main dilemma is containing with the coronavirus through lockdowns and then dealing with the economic impact, in the developing world, apart from containing the virus and dealing with the economic crisis, our biggest worry now is people dying of hunger."

He explained, "So the dilemma, on one side, is stopping people dying from the virus, on the other hand, preventing death from hunger, as a result of the lockdown."

My appeal to the international community, the UNSG & international financial institutions to respond positively to the dilemma confronting developing countries in the face of the COVID19 pandemic. #Global_Initiative_Debt_Relief pic.twitter.com/EfydRhfZhc

— Imran Khan (@ImranKhanPTI) April 12, 2020

Imran Khan said that while developed nations can afford relief or stimulus packages of trillions of dollars, developed nations cannot. "To give an example of Pakistan," he said, "with a population of 220 million people, so far the maximum stimulus package we could afford is 8 billion dollars."

This, he explained, is an issue with "most of the developing world", especially countries with high debt-to-GDP ratios. The Pakistani Prime Minister highlighted that the problem that these "highly indebted countries" are facing is a "lack of fiscal space" that is now proving to be a major hindrance in their efforts to curb the spread of coronavirus and at the same time, providing relief to people.

According to Imran Khan, strong, coordinated and well-crafted global response is needed to control the global pandemic. "...I will be appealing to the world leaders, the heads of financial institutions, and the UNSG to launch an initiative that will give debt relief to developing countries to combat the coronavirus," he said, adding, "The Global Initiative on Debt Relief will bring together stakeholders on a platform to promote coordinated health and economic response."

The Pakistani Prime Minister especially appealed to the UN Secretary-General to work with him in advancing the objectives of a coordinated response. "The proposed Global Initiative aims to lay the ground for urgent debt relief to the developing countries, at their request, and without onerous conditionalities," he said.

It is to be noted that around 450 new positive cases of coronavirus infection were reported in Pakistan on Sunday, bringing the total number of COVID-19 cases in the country to 5,230.