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India, Pak affirm continued commitment to talks

India and Pakistan have agreed that their bilateral relations shall not be held hostage by any one issue.

This identity of views emerged at a meeting between Minister of State for External Affairs Salim Sherwani and his Pakistani counterpart Siddique Khan Ganju yesterday in Male, the Maldives, on the eve of the two-day meeting of the foreign ministers of South Asian Association of Regional Co-operation.

An official spokesperson of the external affairs ministry said both ministers affirmed the need for co-operative relations and spoke of the need for progress on all issues, including people-to-people contacts.

Describing their meeting as cordial, he said the ministers also emphasised the need for a forward movement on Indo-Pak relationships within the SAARC framework.

Meanwhile, Foreign Secretary K Raghunath met Pakistan Foreign Secretary Shamshad Ahmed. Both of them agreed that contacts at their level should continue. They also exchanged views on the modalities of the ongoing Indo-Pakistan official level dialogue and agreed to remain in touch.

The third round of foreign secretary-level talks in September ended in a stalemate, following Pakistan's insistence that a working group should be set up to resolve their differences on the Kashmir issue.

At the second round of talks, the two countries had identified eight issues, which obstructed normalising bilateral relations and decided to set up working groups to deal with them.

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