ISLAMABAD, Dec 28: Prime Minister Mir Zafarullah Khan Jamali has allayed fears of any shift in Kashmir policy and assured that Pakistan will continue to seek a peaceful solution to the dispute.

He was speaking to a group of legislators belonging to his coalition allies as well as leaders of the Muttahida Majlis-i-Amal at the PM house on Sunday.

He also addressed the reservations expressed by the MMA leaders concerning the government’s handling of Kashmir, Afghanistan and Iraq policies.

He explained to the participants the salient features of Pakistan’s foreign policy perspective, and stressed that Kashmir remained the cornerstone of its foreign policy and there was no change in it.

Earlier, the PM presided over a briefing on the upcoming Saarc summit given by foreign minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri for one and a half hour.

Those who attended the briefing from the MMA side included Qazi Hussain Ahmed, Maulana Fazlur Rahman, Maulana Samiul Haq, Liaqat Baloch, and Hafiz Hussain Ahmed while the coalition parliamentary leaders included Chaudhry Shujaat Hussain, Sardar Farooq Ahmed Khan Leghari, Aftab Sherpao, Rao Sikandar Iqbal and others.

The prime minister had extended invitation to all the opposition parties including the ARD in the lower house on Saturday but the rest of the opposition kept away from the meeting and the lunch thereafter.

Earlier, the premier had also arranged a briefing for the coalition and opposition parliamentary leaders last week on the country’s nuclear programme which too was boycotted by the ARD component parties.

Expressing their reservations about Pakistan’s seeming shift in Kashmir policy the MMA leadership pointed to the recent statement of President Gen Pervez Musharraf in which he had hinted at leaving the UN resolutions on Kashmir aside in talks with New Delhi.

The MMA also expressed its skepticism about the ongoing de-briefing of the Pakistani nuclear scientists “at the behest of western powers” and asked the government to stop it immediately.

They also forwarded their proposals for making the country’s foreign policy more beneficial and also asked Islamabad not to show any weakness in its position on Kashmir during the summit.