ISLAMABAD, July 25: British Foreign Secretary David Miliband arrived here on Wednesday, leading a high-level delegation on his first visit to Pakistan after assuming office last month.

He is accompanied by Sir Mark Lyall Grant, former British high commissioner to Pakistan, who is now political director at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.

His official engagements will start on Thursday morning with a meeting with President Gen Pervez Musharraf. Later, he will hold delegation-level talks with Foreign Minister Khurshid Kasuri at the Foreign Office which will be followed by a luncheon. Before his departure in the evening, the British foreign secretary will also call on Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz.

According to foreign ministry officials, the talks would focus on both bilateral and key regional issues. Britain considers Pakistan as a “key strategic partner” and it sees the campaign against terrorism, proliferation and narcotics and the issues of migration and cross-cultural and community relations as common challenges.

Foreign Secretary David Miliband at 41 is the youngest to hold the office in Britain in 30 years. A graduate of Oxford, he is said to be ‘a rising Labour star’ and is seen as a possible future Labour Party leader. His appointment as foreign secretary is perceived in some quarters as a likely shift in British foreign policy to one in which criticism of the US and Israel is not off limits.

Mr Miliband, who earlier served as the Environment secretary in Blair’s final Cabinet, was opposed to the Iraq war and within the Cabinet also criticized the Israeli attack on Hezbollah last year. His brother is the British Cabinet Office Minister.