NEW DELHI: Indian Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao has said that no meeting has been scheduled between the foreign ministers of Pakistan and India on the sidelines of the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) in Port of Spain later this month.

She was briefing journalists here on Friday on the forthcoming visit of Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to the United States and Port of Spain. The prime minister will visit the US from Nov 22 to 26 and attend the CHOGM on Nov 27 and 28.

Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna had earlier said that he was looking forward to meeting Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi in Trinidad. Ms Rao said Prime Minister Singh would discuss regional and global issues with President Barack Obama in Washington.

She said the prime minister would also discuss developments taking place in India’s immediate neighbourhood and the issue of terrorism.

He would express India’s concerns over a terror threat from Pakistani soil, she said.

She said India wanted Pakistan to take credible action to dismantle terror structure on its soil directed against it.

Replying to a question, Ms Rao said India had no objection to All Parties’ Hurriyat Conference chief Mirwaiz Umar Farooq’s proposed visit to China to attend a seminar organised by an NGO.

‘We have stated on many occasions that we have not prevented Kashmiri leaders from travelling abroad. However, the Indian government does not subscribe to the approach taken by the Chinese government of issuing visas to Indian citizens resident of Jammu and Kashmir (on separate sheets of paper instead of passport) which discriminates on the basis of domicile,’ she said.

‘He (Mirwaiz) is free to travel wherever he wants.’ The ministry encouraged such visits, whether to ‘Pakistan or China’, the external affairs minister said.

Talking to reporters in Srinagar, Mirwaiz Farooq asked the Indian government to allow Kashmiris to visit China on stapled visas.

‘It is unfortunate that the government of India has restricted the travel of Kashmiris to China on the stapled visa being provided by the country to the residents of Jammu and Kashmir,’ he said. ‘Let the Kashmiris, including students and academics, be allowed to visit China on stapled visa,’ he said.

CHIDAMBARAM:

Indian Home Minister P. Chidambaram told journalists in New Delhi that an alleged militant held in the United States and under investigation in India over possible links to last year’s attacks in Mumbai had travelled to Pakistan several times.

‘There is a Pakistani link,’ he said about David Coleman Headley who is being held by the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in Chicago.

‘David Headley had visited Pakistan a number of times and on the advice of the FBI two or perhaps more have been arrested in Pakistan.’ he said.

India claims Headley was also associated with the Lashkar-e-Taiba.

External Affairs Minister Krishna separately said India would act only if its investigations established Headley’s suspected links to the carnage.’ An investigation is on and we are awaiting its report. We will pursue the next course of action on the basis of the report,’ he said. ‘Only after that can we examine various options,’ he said, replying to questions by reporters on whether India planned to seek Headley’s extradition.

According to the home minister, Headley and his associate, Tahawwur Hussain Rana, are in detention in the US.

Indian media, citing officials, recently said Headley intended to strike two elite boarding schools and a military academy in India and that he had befriended prominent people from the country’s film industry. — Agencies