Foreign Minister of the United Arab Emirates (UAE) Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed Al-Nahyan is due to arrive in Islamabad Monday to sign several bilateral agreements and to attend the Pakistan-UAE joint commission meeting, official and diplomatic sources said Sunday.

The joint ministerial commission will meet Tuesday to discuss ways to promote political and economic relations.

Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmood Kasuri will represent Pakistan in the joint ministerial commission meeting, which is to be held after a gap of 10 years. The last meeting was held in Abu Dhabi in 1997.

The two sides would also discuss possibilities of more UAE investment in Pakistan, besides pondering over regional matters.

The two sides are expected to discuss cooperation in the fields of national security and communication, besides ties between environment protection, science and technology, education and the promotion of investments.

The Pakistan-UAE joint ministerial commission was set up in 1974 and has so far held eight meetings.

The UAE emerged as one of the largest investors in Pakistan. The investment of the UAE during the last nine months (July 2006 to March 2007) amounted to 343.2 million U.S. dollars, representing 8.9 percent of the total FDI of 3.859 billion dollars.

The UAE last year ranked the first among investors with a total investment of 1.424 billion dollars.

The UAE investments are in the fields of airlines, financial business, housing, telecommunication and oil and gas.

Volume of Trade between the two countries is set to reach 5.1 billion dollars by the end of current financial year, an increase by 20 percent over 4.1 billion dollars in 2005-06 with the balance in favor of the UAE due to Pakistan's import of oil and oil products.

Over the years, the UAE has made generous contributions in various social welfare projects in various parts of the country and has set up about 610 welfare projects during the last three decades.