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ISLAMABAD: Pakistan urged Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday to back up his call for re-engagement with concrete measures to address issues its concern. “Pakistan is ready for sustained and meaningful dialogue on all issues and it is for India to revisit its position on issues such as Jammu and Kashmir, peace and security and Siachen,” Foreign Office spokesman Abdul Basit told Dawn.
He was reacting to Indian PM Singh’s call for continuing the process of engagement with Pakistan.
“We have decided to engage with Pakistan and I hope Mr Qureshi accepts the invitation to come to India,” Mr Singh told newspapers editors in Delhi.
Commenting on Mr Singh’s statement, other senior officials at the Foreign Office responsible for managing relations with India said the ball was in New Delhi’s court.
Foreign ministers of Pakistan and India held talks in July for bridging mistrust, but the talks ended in a deadlock because of Indian insistence on not discussing Jammu and Kashmir, Siachen and issues pertaining to peace and security, particularly the strategic restraint regime.
The Indian side, sources say, wanted to keep talks on the three subjects open ended. The Indians reportedly told their Pakistani counterparts that these issues would be taken up at an ‘appropriate time’.
An official said Pakistan could agree to return to talks if Indians were willing to commit to a roadmap covering Jammu and Kashmir, Siachen and peace and security, in addition to issues on which both countries had agreed like commerce and trade, culture, Sir Creek, terrorism and confidence-building measures on Kashmir.
Indian External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna had, after the failed July 15 talks in Islamabad, invited Mr Qureshi to visit Delhi.
Although there was officially no reply to the invitation, Mr Qureshi at a media interaction had made acceptance of the invitation conditional to India’s willingness to talk on ‘full range’ of issues that have bedevilled bilateral relations for decades.
India’s $25 million aid for Pakistani flood victims and release of 442 Indian fishermen by Pakistan last week had fuelled hopes that the two countries were desirous of resolving their differences.
