NEW DELHI, Feb 20: Pakistani Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri has said that Islamabad will hold the delayed Saarc summit in late October, The Asian Age newspaper reported on Thursday.

It quoted Mr Kasuri as saying in a telephone interview with the paper: “I will try my best to see that the leadership of India changes its mind and participates.”

Mr Kasuri said initial discussions carried out by his government for the Saarc summit appeared to be settling for October as “this appears to fit into the schedule of most heads of state and government”.

The foreign minister said he would personally like the summit to be held “sooner rather than later”, but the latter part of the year appeared to suit member nations more.

He insisted that Pakistan remained “committed to the Saarc process” and said he was optimistic that this time all the nations would participate.

Not commenting in any depth at the frustrations within Saarc’s free trade arrangements, Mr Kasuri said: “We would not have gone to Kathmandu had we not been interested in the economic agreements.”

The paper said Mr Kasuri also continued to press for talks between India and Pakistan. He said he was an optimist for after all Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and President Pervez Musharraf “had almost reached an agreement in Agra” until it was scuttled by “hardliners.”

He said that despite the stated positions, “let us start talking and a solution will emerge from that.”

Mr Kasuri said India had been maintaining that fundamentalist forces were on the rise in Pakistan. “We should then be making political capital of this by saying, all right, then there can be no talks. But we are not saying this.”

The Asian Age said Mr Kasuri “indulged in a frontal attack on the Indian government”, saying “the present ruling party seems to have a domestic political agenda guiding them.”

Mr Kasuri accused India of ratcheting up tensions for “domestic purposes.” He said: “It was a pity that the leadership of the present government feels compelled to say at least once a week that it will not talk to Pakistan.”

The paper said Mr Kasuri was not particularly forthcoming about how he would persuade India to change its mind and continued to insist that “Pakistan has done all it can to stop cross-border infiltration” while regretting that economic agreements under Saarc had “unfortunately acquired political overtones.”

Asked whether Pakistan was going to stress upon the differences with India or find commonalities in the agenda at the NAM meeting, Mr Kasuri said poverty was a major source of concern and that NAM had terms of trade between rich and poor nations on its agenda.

There was little mention of Kashmir in the interview, the paper said.

At one point Mr Kasuri said talks were important as “we have to provide incentives for the people of Kashmir, we have to hold out hope.”