December 9, 2003	Tuesday	Shawwal 14, 1424

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NEW DELHI, Dec 8: Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Jamali called Indian Premier Atal Behari Vajpayee on Monday, promising him a warm welcome in Islamabad next month as well as fruitful talks on regional issues, Indian officials said.

Indian news agencies cited “postive developments” in Indo-Pakistan ties as the reason behind Mr Jamali’s call to Mr Vajpayee. The Indian premier had just returned from a Commonwealth summit in Abuja. He had written to Mr Jamali last week shortly before leaving for Nigeria. Mr Jamali expressed appreciation to Mr Vajpayee for confirming his attendance at the Saarc summit, saying a “warm welcome” awaited him, the officials said.

The call coincided with a rare outing for Pakistan’s High Commissioner in New Delhi, Aziz Ahmed Khan, who was in Kolkata as his country’s first diplomat to be allowed out of the capital since the relations strained in December 2001. Mr Khan will deliver on Tuesday the prestigious keynote address to the Bengal Initiative, a peace NGO.

During the five-minute conversation with Mr Jamali, Mr Vajpayee told him that he was looking forward to his visit to Islamabad. Both leaders agreed that there had been “positive bilateral developments” over the past few weeks, including the ceasefire along the LoC. They felt it was important that these positive trends were sustained.

Mr Vajpayee recalled that in their last conversation they had discussed the importance of people-to-people contact and economic cooperation, and said progress had been made in these areas.