06 January 2005	Thursday	24 Ziqa'ad 1425

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NEW DELHI, Jan 5: India and Pakistan on Wednesday extended by a day their talks on the disputed Baglihar hydro-electric project on river Chenab in Jammu and Kashmir, saying they were in the process of understanding each other's viewpoint.

"We had short listed six key technical issues in our talks yesterday. We had discussions on them today in a constructive and focussed manner. We are still midway. We are understanding each other's viewpoint. We hope to conclude by tomorrow," India's secretary for water resources, V.K. Duggal said.

Pakistani officials said they would wait for one more day for India to clarify its position on the six points raised by Islamabad and they suggested that some kind of a change in India's position could not be ruled out.

Pakistan says it does not object to a power project but has reservations on the design. The six questions pertain to these technicalities. Although the Indian side has conveyed the impression that the dam was not due to be inauguarted before December 2007, there were announcements on websites to the effect that the due date was actually in December this year.

This discrepancy was noted by the Pakistan side, which wants the minutes of their talks to be recorded and agreed to avoid future misunderstandings. Mr Duggal said the talks were initially scheduled for three days, but it was decided to conclude them by Wednesday evening. However, later, it was decided to extend the discussions by another day as "we are still midway".

Pakistan's Secretary for Water and Power Ashfaq Mehmood, who is leading a nine-member delegation, said: "We are having issue-based discussions. We are in the middle of sharing of analysis. We had a very good programme and we hope by tomorrow, we will be able to reach certain conclusions."

Both sides refrained from discussing Pakistan's threat to take the matter to World Bank's arbitration if the talks fail. Privately though some Pakistani officials said they were not confident if this could be prevented. Pakistan hopeful about removal of its reservations on Baglihar dam: Masood

APP ADDS: In Islamabad Pakistan expressed the hope that India would make sincere efforts to remove its reservations on the dam. Talking to PTV, Foreign Office Spokesman Masood Khan said: "There is no reason why both the countries should not succeed if India responds to Pakistan's legitimate concerns over construction of the dam."

He said if the dam was constructed in accordance with its existing specifications it would violate provision of the Indus Treaty and hurt Pakistan rights and interests.

In reply to a question, he said during Tuesday meeting Pakistan delegation had raised some technical issues in accordance with the Indus Water Treaty. He said during the Wednesday meeting, the Indian delegation has responded to these points.

Masood Khan said Pakistan had raised objections to the design, height, storage capacity and gates of the spillway structure during the Tuesday meeting. The spokesman said that in accordance with the treaty, India had limited rights on the water of river Chenab. However, he added, Pakistan had legitimate rights over Chenab.