India wants terror on talks agenda

Foreign secretaries may meet on Feb 18 or 25; composite dialogue unlikely

 However, New Delhi is loathe to resuming the composite dialogue process.
As India awaits Pakistan’s response to its proposal to hold the foreign secretary level talks here on February 18 or 25, government sources on Sunday said that New Delhi would continue to be firm on its stand that any meaningful dialogue with Islamabad would be possible only in an environment free of terror.

They claimed that New Delhi’s proposal for foreign secretary level talks with Islamabad was a pragmatic approach to “unlock” the channels of communication with Islamabad and make the latter act decisively against anti-India terrorist outfits that operate out of its territory.

Other issues

New Delhi is also likely to make it clear to Islamabad that any repeat of 26/11 type terrorist attack by Pakistan-based outfits would be “a huge setback” to bilateral ties.

Investigating the Mumbai 26/11 terrorist attacks, trying the plotters in Pakistan, cross-border terrorism, the recent spurt in infiltration bids by militants in Jammu and Kashmir and last week’s meeting of the anti-India terrorist organisations in Lahore and Muzaffarabad are among the issues New Delhi is keen to raise with Islamabad when the foreign secretaries of the two countries meet here.

Sources said that India was also prepared to discuss issues like Kashmir and Balochistan.

“Our position on Kashmir is well-known and we have nothing to hide on Balochistan,” said a senior government official.

New Delhi, however, is keen to make it clear that the foreign secretary level talks with Islamabad should not be construed as resumption of the Indo-Pak Composite Dialogue. “Let us not get stuck in semantics,” said the official, reacting to Pakistan’s insistence on resumption of Composite Dialogue.

India and Pakistan had started talks in February 2004 to discuss eight issues, including Kashmir, Sir Creek and Siachen. But India suspended the process in the wake of the attacks in Mumbai on November 26, 2008, stating that it would not be resumed unless Islamabad brought the masterminds and perpetrators of the 26/11 to justice and dismantled all terrorist facilities operating on Pakistan soil.

But Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao recently called up her Pakistani counterpart Salman Bashir and invited him to come to Delhi for talks. Pakistani High Commissioner to India, Shahid Malik, called on Rao last Friday to discuss the format, agenda and dates for the talks. India proposed February 18 or 25 as possible dates. Islamabad, however, is yet to revert back to New Delhi.

Rao and Bashir earlier met in New York ahead of External Affairs Minister S M Krishna’s meeting with Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi on the sidelines of the UN Assembly on September 28 last year.

Stating that the latest offer of talks with Pakistan was not a climb-down from India’s post 26/11 stand, top government sources said New Delhi had noted that Islamabad had taken certain steps to prosecute the seven plotters of the Mumbai attacks.

India is likely to put pressure on Pakistan to ensure that Hafiz Saeed, the chief of LeT’s front Jamat-ud-Dawa, and 13 others absconding masterminds of 26/11 carnage were brought to justice.