Pakistan NSA-level talks on August 23

Islamabad summoned India’s deputy high commissioner JP Singh not once, but twice to register protest.

Aziz said the decision was taken after consultations.

The Prime Minister did not send a tough message to Pakistan from the ramparts of the Red Fort on Independence Day.

On Thursday, Sartaz confirmed that he would visit India on August 23 for the talks.

It also objected to India and Pakistan holding National Security Adviser-level talks amid constant ceasefire violations by Pakistani troops.

Despite the recent series of militant attacks and border skirmishes, Aziz said he would be travelling to the Indian capital, New Delhi, next week and he hoped the talks would at least break the ice on some of a range of outstanding issues. The arrest of a Pakistani terrorist in Udhampur and the Gurdaspur attack perpetrated, as the government said in Parliament, by Pakistani nationals have strengthened Doval’s resolve to discuss terror with Islamabad.

India has long accused neighbouring Pakistan of pushing separatist Muslim militants into India’s portion of the Kashmir region to foment revolt in India’s only Muslim-majority region, which both nations claim.

The talks will be held as per agreement reached during a meeting between Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his Indian Counterpart Narendra Modi in the Russian City of Ufa on July 10.

“Aspirations of the people of Jammu and Kashmir could neither be ignored nor put on the back burner”, Basit said.

Sources said that India had proposed August 23 and 24 as the dates, but hadn’t got a confirmation from Pakistan.

Tewari insisted that the BJP led-NDA Government should cut off all the contacts with Pakistan till the time ceasefire violations continue to take place across the border.

“We would also like to set the record straight that it was on account of a robust bilateral policy followed by India with regards to the United Arab Emirates since 1971, the year in which the UAE was created, that the country has the largest Indian expat population and an increasingly burgeoning trade which has constantly seen investments flowing to India”, the Congress leader added.