Sushma Swaraj to meet Nawaz Sharif: Aziz

Swaraj will travel tomorrow for a multilateral conference in Islamabad, where she will also hold talks with her Pakistani counterpart Sartaj Aziz.

On Sunday, it was revealed that the NSA of India and Pakistan had held a secret meeting in Bangkok and discussed a range of issues, including peace and security, terrorism and Jammu and Kashmir.

The foreign ministers of the two countries are expected to meet later this week in in Islamabad where Sushma Swaraj is scheduled to attend a conference on Afghanistan.

Indian Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj will hold talks with Pakistan on Wednesday, the first visit by India’s top diplomat to its rival in three years, part of efforts to restart a peace dialogue plagued by militant attacks and distrust.

Pakistan has consistently reiterated that there can not unless the problem of Kashmir is about the schedule be any conversation with India. The media on the two sides are so polarised that at times they have seemed more hawkish than the most extreme opinions in either country.

On the pending decision regarding the bilateral cricket series between India and Pakistan Aziz said that he is waiting for response from the Indian Cricket Board. Aside from the not so mild nudges from the United States, for India, the freeze on talks would have began telling on different issues – in 2016, Islamabad hosts the SAARC summit, and it’s crucial that Prime Minister Narendra Modi ought to attend it, particularly provided that he kicked off his prime ministership with an outreach to the area.

Out of the two, the meeting between Swaraj and Aziz will be the one that could set the tone for the next rounds of engagement, say Indian officials.

The Indian government will now be talking to the military directly, a shift in the 17 months with New Delhi’s aggressive diplomacy allowing the Pakistan military to ease out the civilian apparatus altogether insofar as the bilateral dialogue is concerned. “Talks must proceed in the right direction for the improvement of relations between the two countries”, Menon told ANI here.

Congress leader Shashi Tharoor demanded a clarification from the government on ties with Pakistan, saying the prime minister needs to explain the Centre’s position to the nation as they can’t keep changing their stand with the hostile neighbour.