ISLAMABAD, Jan 31: Pakistan attaches significance to an expected meeting in Dhaka, on the sidelines of the 13th Saarc summit on February 6, between the prime ministers of Pakistan and India on the future course of the composite dialogue and on the need to push it forward to resolve disputes such as Jammu and Kashmir and other issues relating to peace and security and promote bilateral trade, commerce and cultural relations.

Responding to questions at his weekly press briefing here on Monday, Foreign Office spokesman Masood Khan said that some reported statements emanating from New Delhi in the recent past seemed to create uncertainties about the future of the composite talks initiated early last year.

He said that official Indian statements reflected inflexibility, particularly in its Kashmir stand, while Islamabad insisted on creating space for the talks on various possibilities or options on the Kashmir issue.

The spokesman said Pakistan believed that high-level talks should be held now that the second round of the composite dialogue had begun to discuss the remaining items in the six-point agenda and the whole process had to culminate in rounds of talks on Kashmir and peace and security.

He indicated that the two sides had to sort out issues of the corridor for the trans-Pakistan gas pipeline. The spokesman hoped that the talks might get a fresh impetus when at Pakistan's invitation, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was expected to visit Islamabad any time in March or soon after.

That, he said, would enable the two countries to discuss the most difficult issue of Jammu and Kashmir dividing the two countries and issues impinging on peace and security.

Answering a question, the spokesman said that a reported statement of Israeli Deputy Prime Minister Shimon Peres to a Karachi-based TV and newspaper about recognition of Israel by Pakistan was not received officially and he would not comment on it.

He, however, added that the attack by a group of rowdies on the media's offices in Karachi was condemnable, asserting that no official hand was involved in it. He recalled that the president of Pakistan while encouraging freedom of thought and speech had himself suggested in 2003 that people should freely express their thoughts on world issues, including the existence of an Israeli state and relations with it in the changing world situation.

The spokesman emphasised that the government had stipulated certain conditions which, if accepted by Tel Aviv, might take Pakistan in the direction of recognition of Israel.

But, he added, Israeli authorities should explicitly recognize the rights of the Palestinian people and accept that human rights violations of the Palestinians should come to an end and that there should be an Arab consensus on a durable roadmap for peace. He said Islamabad had noted Mr Peres' statement, though it had not received it officially.

The spokesman said that Pakistan wanted to defuse the mounting tension between the West and Iran over the nuclear issue, being close friend of both Iran and the Untied States.

Pakistan would like to play, if possible, some role in defusing the dangerously gathering storm by creating an enabling environment for talks among the parties concerned because any military conflict in the region would be serious and harmful for its people.

In reply to a question, Mr Masood Khan said Pakistan was ready to provide a bus service for Kashmiris between the two parts of J&K as proposed by India - promptly and in just a few days - provided New Delhi dropped insistence on regular passports for travellers and instead accepted special travel permits issued by the authorities on the two sides of the disputed state.

Without commenting on the nature of the Sunday's national assembly elections in Iraq amid violence, the spokesman told an Arab journalist that as a strongly bonded and a very firm and old friend of the people of that country, Pakistan wished that the Iraqis would overcome this difficult phase in their history and that there would be peace and stability in their country.

There would be future for the people of Iraq, the children of Iraq, where democracy could flourish, where representation was given due space and recognition, the spokesman hoped.