ISLAMABAD, Jan 5: The Indian and Pakistani leadership have agreed on certain "common points" that could help start foreign-secretary level talks shortly. An official source told Dawn here on Monday that "a breakthrough has been achieved" in finding certain common points to initiate the much-delayed senior-level officials talks , possibly during the month of January.

He also confirmed that Indian Special Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra had met some senior government officials, including the director-general of Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI), to discuss various issues, including the region's security environment. However, Indian External Affairs Minister Yashwant Sinha parried the question when asked during his news conference whether Mr Mishra had had a meeting with the ISI boss.

Former foreign secretary Niaz A. Naik, who is very active these days and is being regularly consulted by senior Foreign Office officials, told Dawn that both sides "have succeeded" in finding some 'solid basis' on which to start their future dialogue.

"My information is that a breakthrough has been achieved, first during the meeting between the two prime ministers and then between President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Vajpayee, to undertake negotiations on a regular basis," he said.

Mr Naik, who is pursuing Track-II diplomacy to unofficially resolve differences between India and Pakistan since 1990, said that finding a common ground was a difficult job to start formal talks between the two sides. "I am told that both sides have agreed this time to hold discreet, continuous, profound and deep talks to arrive at a solution on Kashmir," the former diplomat said.

"Both sides also found for the first time a new expression of determination to carry forward the peace process," he added. Responding to a question, Mr Naik said there were many peace proposals and formulas to sort out the Kashmir dispute but the Bush administration was apparently giving more importance to the "Chanab formula" being championed by an American study group.

Asked about Mishra-DG ISI meeting, he said that Indians looked concerned over two assassination attempts on President Musharraf and wanted to know more about it.