NEW DELHI, July 28: Confirming that proposals regarding dates for resuming talks have been received from Pakistan, official sources said here today that mutually convenient dates for resuming the remaining third round of comprehensive dialogues were being discussed.
Pakistan media had yesterday reported that the foreign office conveyed to New Delhi its readiness to host the talks on the Wallular barrage at Water and Power Secretaries level on August 27 and 28 and for Sir Creek maritime boundary issue on September 16 and 17.
A meeting at the level of foreign secretaries could be considered later.
Official sources said the proposals for dates had been received from Pakistan last week itself, and now “India and Pakistan are in discussion to identify mutually convenient dates for the remaining Secretary-level talks of the third round.
The talks on water and Sir Creek issues are expected to be held in Pakistan while interior secretary/home secretary-level meeting and defence secretary-level talks on the Siachen Glacier were likely to be held in India.
New Delhi has also “in principle” agreed to a meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif on the sidelines of UN General Assembly in New York in September.
External Affairs Minister Salman Kurshid and Pakistan Prime Minister’s Special Advisor on Foreign Affairs Sartaj Aziz had taken the decision to resume the dialogue process when they had met in Brunei early this month.
The two countries had begun the third round of the dialogue in September with Commerce Secretaries’s meeting in Islamabad, but the process was halted due to the strain in the bilateral relations caused by the beheading of Indian soldiers on the border.
Both the countries had in fact started a composite dialogue in
2004 after a decision for that was taken by then prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and former Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf during their meeting on the sidelines of SAARC Summit.
However that composite dialogue process had been suspended in the wake of the Mumbai terror attack in 2008.
But Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his former Pakistani counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani in their meeting on the sidelines of SAARC summit In Bhutan’s capital Thimpu in 2010 decided to resume the process.
The issues to be covered by the Composite Dialogue include Siachin; Wullar Barrage/Tulbul Navigation Project; Sir Creek; economic and commercial cooperation and friendly exchanges; terrorism and drug trafficking; peace and security and Jammu and Kashmir. (UNI)
Follow our WhatsApp channel