ISLAMABAD: The Fore­ign Office said on Thursday that there was no obstacle in fixing the date for a meeting between the foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India for finalising modalities of the Comprehensive Bilateral Dialogue. It was now a matter of schedule more than anything else, he added..

“It has not been suggested at any stage that these talks will not take place. The two sides are discussing a mutually convenient date for the talks,” Foreign Office spokesman Nafees Zakaria said at a weekly media briefing.

He recalled a statement of Indian High Commissioner Gautam Bambawale in which he had said that there was no link between the secretaries’ meeting and the Pathankot attack investigation.

The secretaries were to meet on Jan 15, but the meeting was postponed in the aftermath of the Pathankot episode. The two sides, while postponing the meeting, had said that it would be held soon, but they are yet to agree on a new date.

Pakistani authorities last week registered a police report on the basis of Indian allegations that the attack on the airbase was carried out by a group of four people, who had crossed the border into Pathankot from Pakistan.

The registration of FIR is believed to have paved the way for the start of investigations and visit of a team of Pakistani investigators to India for collecting evidence related to the case.

“A Special Investigating Team (SIT), constituted by the Prime Minister, is likely to visit India shortly. The two sides are in touch with each other with regard to the visit,” Mr Zakaria said.

“The Indian government has agreed, in principle, to the visit of our Special Investigating team (SIT),” the spokesman added.

He insisted that full cooperation was being extended to India ever since it approached Pakistan for this purpose.

Reacting to a report by Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), which described India as the largest arms importer, the spokesman said: “We seek peace in South Asia. We are against any arms race. Due to the massive defence build-up by India and the discriminatory treatment given to India by the Nuclear Supplier Group (NSG), a number of analysts have concluded that these policies will disturb the strategic balance in the region.”

TALIBAN TALKS: Mr Zakaria said that it had been agreed by the Quadrilateral Coordination Group on Afghan reconciliation that the insurgent groups agreeing to join the upcoming direct talks with Afghan government could do so without any conditions.

“It was decided with consensus that the talks under the QCG process will be without pre-conditions,” he maintained.

The first round of direct talks would take place in Pakistan expectedly in the first week of March.

Published in Dawn, February 26th, 2016