Pakistan's president announced the next round of peace talks with rival India will take place later this year, just after the Indian elections, and that foreign ministers from the two sides will soon get involved in the negotiations.
President General Pervez Musharraf broke the news in a speech at a conference of Islamic clerics on the sidelines of the historic first round of peace talks between the two nations.
The talks are being held between the two country's foreign secretaries, and a move to include foreign ministers would mean a significant boost in the level of the negotiations. A delay until after India's April vote had long been suspected.
"The talks have been held now. I want to tell you that in July or August, or God willing, in May or June, the next secretary-level talks will be held, immediately after the elections in India," Musharraf said. "The Kashmir issue will be included and in July or August, a foreign minister-level composite dialogue will be held."
The latest peace talks have raised hopes that the South Asian rivals can put their half-century of enmity over Kashmir and other issues behind them.
India's Secretary for External Ministry Affairs, Shashank, who uses one name, and Pakistan's Foreign Secretary Riaz Khokhar met yesterday in the last of three-days of talks that have been taking place in the Pakistani capital.
Even before Musharraf's announcement, the two sides had voiced optimism.
"We expect this round of talks to succeed and kick-start the composite dialogue," Pakistan's Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan said. "Things are moving smoothly and we are optimistic."
A breakthrough on the timetable was reached Tuesday, but specifics were not announced until Musharraf's speech. Further details were likely to be held at a press conference later yesterday after the formal end of the talks.
Pakistan and India have fought two out of their three wars since gaining independence from Britain in 1947 over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir. The two countries agreed at a regional conference last month that the time had come to resolve the issue, and they have moved quickly since then to cement better ties.
India and Pakistan were expected to set up eight groups to tackle the decades-old Kashmir dispute, build confidence and deal with issues such as nuclear arms, terrorism, drugs and trade. The agenda was first agreed to in 1997 but failed to make any headway.
Diplomats close to the talks also said technical-level discussions about a bus service in divided Kashmir and another bus and train route from Pakistan's Sindh province would take place next month.
Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee is expected to win the April vote and continue the dialogue.
On Tuesday, the two delegations drove to Murree, a hilltop resort 50km northeast of Islamabad, and just a few kilometers from the Pakistani-controlled portion of Kashmir, where the agreement was reached over lunch.
The three-day summit came after Vajpayee and Musharraf decided last month to resume a peace dialogue. A July 2001 summit in Agra, India failed to make any progress.
A ceasefire line divides Kashmir between India and Pakistan, but both claim the territory in its entirety. More than 65,000 people have been killed in an insurgency that has raged in Indian-controlled portions of the territory since 1989.
In January, Vajpayee agreed to discuss Kashmir while Musharraf promised not to support terrorism in Pakistani territory directed against India. India accuses Pakistan of training and arming Islamic guerrillas fighting for Kashmir's independence from India or its merger with Pakistan, a charge Pakistan denies.
Early this month, Indian Defense Minister George Fernandes said Pakistan's government has taken effective measures against Islamic militant groups based in Pakistan, leading to a decline in incursions into Indian-controlled Kashmir.
Airlines in Australia, Hong Kong, India, Malaysia and Singapore yesterday canceled flights to and from the Indonesian island of Bali, after a nearby volcano catapulted an ash tower into the sky. Australia’s Jetstar, Qantas and Virgin Australia all grounded flights after Mount Lewotobi Laki-Laki on Flores island spewed a 9km tower a day earlier. Malaysia Airlines, AirAsia, India’s IndiGo and Singapore’s Scoot also listed flights as canceled. “Volcanic ash poses a significant threat to safe operations of the aircraft in the vicinity of volcanic clouds,” AirAsia said as it announced several cancelations. Multiple eruptions from the 1,703m twin-peaked volcano in
A plane bringing Israeli soccer supporters home from Amsterdam landed at Israel’s Ben Gurion airport on Friday after a night of violence that Israeli and Dutch officials condemned as “anti-Semitic.” Dutch police said 62 arrests were made in connection with the violence, which erupted after a UEFA Europa League soccer tie between Amsterdam club Ajax and Maccabi Tel Aviv. Israeli flag carrier El Al said it was sending six planes to the Netherlands to bring the fans home, after the first flight carrying evacuees landed on Friday afternoon, the Israeli Airports Authority said. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu also ordered
Former US House of Representatives speaker Nancy Pelosi said if US President Joe Biden had ended his re-election bid sooner, the Democratic Party could have held a competitive nominating process to choose his replacement. “Had the president gotten out sooner, there may have been other candidates in the race,” Pelosi said in an interview on Thursday published by the New York Times the next day. “The anticipation was that, if the president were to step aside, that there would be an open primary,” she said. Pelosi said she thought the Democratic candidate, US Vice President Kamala Harris, “would have done
Farmer Liu Bingyong used to make a tidy profit selling milk but is now leaking cash — hit by a dairy sector crisis that embodies several of China’s economic woes. Milk is not a traditional mainstay of Chinese diets, but the Chinese government has long pushed people to drink more, citing its health benefits. The country has expanded its dairy production capacity and imported vast numbers of cattle in recent years as Beijing pursues food self-sufficiency. However, chronically low consumption has left the market sloshing with unwanted milk — driving down prices and pushing farmers to the brink — while
RSS