Less than a year after their controversial engagement in Sharm-el-Sheikh, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani will meet in Thimphu on with little expectations of any breakthrough. The two leaders shook hands twice during the opening day of the SAARC Summit today and Singh is expected to convey India's strong demand for action by Pakistan against the perpetrators of the Mumbai attack to Gilani.
Leaders of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation countries vowed to collectively combat the scourge of terrorism, extremism and insurgency plaguing the region with Pakistan and Bangladesh rejecting claims of those who justified violence in the name of Islam.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh ruled out any rollback in hike in petrol and diesel prices, saying the economy has the capacity to absorb the increase without triggering an inflationary spiral. Singh also made it clear that following populist fiscal policies for long harmed the economy, two days after key United Pogressive Alliance allies Trinamool Congress and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam made a strong pitch for the rollback.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said on Monday that he had asked Saudi Arabia to use its "good offices" to persuade Pakistan to desist from the path of terror.
India is willing to walk the "extra mile" to open a new chapter in relations with Pakistan but it must act decisively against terrorism, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh asserted on Monday."We seek cooperative relations with Pakistan. Our objective is a permanent peace because we recognise that we are bound together by a shared future. If there is cooperation between India and Pakistan, vast opportunities will open up for trade and development that will create prosperity.
Giving a new dynamism to bilateral ties, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Sunday said India sees Saudi Arabia as a strategic partner for promoting peace, stability and economic development and that the conditions were ripe for the two countries to enter into a comprehensive energy partnership.
In an apparent climbdown, India today dropped its insistence on refusing to hold talks with Pakistan till those behind the Mumbai terror attacks were punished but Prime Minister Manmohan Singh clarified that the "composite dialogue" will not be resumed.
Ahead of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's meeting with his Pakistan counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani, India on Wednesday sounded positive on continuing talks but said there were some "difficult" issues still remaining and Islamabad needed to take credible action to bring the perpetrators of the Mumbai attacks to justice.
Addressing the plenary session, Dr Singh also warned that there could be a period of prolonged stagflation if the aftermath of the global financial crisis was not carefully managed.
Opening the two-day 15th NAM Summit of the 118 developing nations at this Egyptian Red Sea resort city, Cuban President Raul Castro said the grouping believes that all countries in the world should search for effective and justified measures to tackle the current financial crisis.
Foreign Secretaries of the two countries on Wednesday discussed a whole range of issues including the detention and release of Jamaat-ud Dawah chief Mohammed Hafeez Saeed, believed to be the mastermind of the 26/11 attacks.
Foreign Secretaries of India and Pakistan have met and held "good detailed discussions" on terrorism at Sharm el-Shiekh in Egypt ahead of Thursday's meeting between prime ministers of the two countries to review Islamabad's action on its commitment to bring to justice the perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attacks.
Preparing the ground for the meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani in Egypt, Islamabad has handed over a fresh dossier on its probe into the Mumbai terror attacks to New Delhi which is figuring out what it amounts to.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh arrived in Paris on Monday night on a visit which is expected to help India and France "build" a strategic partnership in atomic energy, defence, trade and other key areas. Singh was accorded a warm welcome on his arrival to the French capital .
Bicycles, car pools and fans are making a comeback into the lives of Japanese people battling soaring oil prices and global warming.
The issue of Doha round of WTO talks dominated the discussions as Prime Minister Manmahon Singh met his British counterpart Gordon Brown here and agreed on the need for pushing the stalled negotiations. Brown, while favouring cut in farm subsidies in the US and the Europe, voiced optimism that an agreement could be reached in the global trade talks that have got stuck due to stiff opposition by India and some other developing countries on agriculture subsidies.
With Pakistan's possible suspension from the grouping expected to dominate the Commonwealth Heads of Government meet, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh left Delhi on Thursday for Kampala where hot issues like climate change, human rights and terrorism will also be on the agenda.
The two leaders are understood to have discussed ways to expand bilateral ties. The 30-minute meeting took place on the sidelines of the ASEAN-India summit. Trade between the two countries has been growing at a rapid pace and the two nations have set an ambitious target of $10 billion to be achieved by 2010.
China was forthcoming and supportive of international civil nuclear energy cooperation with India as the two countries affirmed their readiness to take their strategic and cooperative partnership to a new level at the ASEAN summit in Singapore on Wednesday.
Terming India's ties with the ASEAN as a 'pillar' of its 'Look East' policy, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday proposed a bilateral trade target of $50 billion by 2010 and sought boosting of cooperation with the key ten-member grouping in technology, health care, climate change and tourism.