Noting that India is yet to see Pakistan take effective steps to end infiltration and dismantle terror infrastructure, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said on Monday that a "meaningful dialogue" cannot be possible till Islamabad implements its commitments on these counts.
The Pakistan government has trashed former president Pervez Musharraf's four-point formula to resolve Kashmir issue, saying it was "his thinking" which did not have the endorsement of Pakistan Parliament or Cabinet and suggested a fresh approach to address the vexed problem.
As he prepares to meet External Affairs Minister S M Krishna in July, Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has said 'nothing dramatic' should be expected from 'one sitting' and emphasised that the dialogue process should be made 'irreversible'.Qureshi, who along with Krishna has been tasked to bridge the trust deficit, said mutual suspicions were the main reason for the trust gap and the two countries should work towards removing those.
As attacks against Indians continued unabated in Australia, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna met his Australian counterpart Stephen Smith for the second time in two days and is understood to have conveyed displeasure over the assaults on Thursday.
The London Conference on Afghanistan will be an occasion which India could use to showcase its massive humanitarian efforts in war-ravaged countries, which many diplomats believe is "undervalued" and little understood by the international community. India is providing US $ 1.3 billion in aid to improve infrastructure, education and medical health of the beleaguered country.
Talking tough, India asked Australia to put in more effective security measures to check the attacks on Indians there, failing which it said the people-to-people exchanges which includes those going for education and tourism will get "adversely" affected.
All Indians in tsunami-hit Japan are safe and India will extend all assistance to help the people of Japan in its hour of crisis, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said on Monday. "I spoke to the ambassador there. The ambassador told me that all the 25,000 Indians in Japan -- most of them are in and around Tokyo -- they are all safe and he is in touch with the Indian community," Krishna told reporters outside Parliament. He said the embassy will "do whatever is possible".
"India has consistently articulated its desire to play a more constructive and meaningful role as an observer at the SCO," External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said, addressing the 10th summit of the forum in the Uzbek capital of Tashkent.
The post-mortem on the United States-India Strategic Dialogue co-chaired by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and External Affairs Minister S M Krishna -- which also had the icing on the cake of President Barack Obama attending and delivering remarks at Clinton's reception for Krishna and the Indian delegation at the conclusion of the talks, where he pledged his unequivocal commitment to further US-India ties -- in the eyes of South Asia experts in Washington, DC, was mix
The government on Friday said that the G-8 resolution -- on curbing the transfer of enrichment and reprocessing (ENR) technology to non-Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty signatory countries -- was 'not a legally binding document' and hoped individual nations will implement civil nuclear agreements with India on bilateral basis. External Affairs Minister S M Krishna also allayed concerns over the End-User Monitoring Agreement (EUMA) with the United States.
India can remain aloof only at its own peril to the challenges and opportunities presented by China's rapid ascendancy, Union External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said on Thursday.
A joint statement, issued at the end of the talks between External Affairs Minister S M Krishna and Afghanistan Foreign Minister Rangin Dadfar Spanta, said: "They highlighted terrorism as the most important security threat facing the region and reiterated their full resolve to combat it."
Krishna said whether it was a racist attack or motivated by something else "the fact of the matter is that an Indian student has been murdered and the Australian government is duty bound and morally bound to go for investigations and then bring the culprit to book".
Raising the pitch for concerted and joint fight against terrorism, India on Wednesday pressed for 'cooperative regional approaches' to defeat the scourge and early adoption by the United Nations of an international convention against terror.
Cautioning that no part of the world could claim to be immune from terrorism, India on Wednesday pressed for early adoption of a proposed convention to fight the menace pending at the United Nations, saying it could materialise if the international community showed political will.
Krishna, during an interaction with a group of journalists, noted that like in the case of Jammu and Kashmir, the maharaja of Mysore had also signed an accession treaty "and I am a citizen of Mysore"
Sheela Bhatt analyses India's election to the UNSC after 19 years.
Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi has agreed to come here and India is looking forward to the visit during which the two sides will try to reduce differences, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna said in New Delhi on Tuesday. The minister said India has been trying to build cordial relations with Pakistan and hoped for "reciprocity" of these efforts.
India is 'very cautiously and responsibly' evaluating the conflicting signals emanating from Pakistan on punishing the perpetrators of the Mumbai terror attacks and is waiting for its 'visible and credible' actions against them. Voicing his disapproval over the release of Lashkar-e-Tayiba founder Hafeez Saeed, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on Sunday said India has not yet received any official communication about Pakistan government's appeal.
India said onTuesday that all issues, including India's concerns over terrorism, will be discussed during External Affairs Minister S M Krishna's talks with Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi in July. "No issues are to be kept aside," Krishna told journalists accompanying him on his three-day visit to Kazakhstan.
External Affairs Minister S M Krishna will visit Islamabad on July 15 for talks with his Pakistan counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi to work out the modalities for carrying forward the dialogue process to discuss outstanding issues in an atmosphere of mutual trust.
The less charitable in the party say he owes his appointment Sonia Gandhi -- the family wanted someone who wouldn't talk back and would not exert himself too much, notes Aditi Phadnis.
Their talks in New York might not have materialised, but External Affairs Minister S M Krishna has invited his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi to visit India to witness the Commonwealth Games.
The irritants that have cropped up in recent weeks in relations between India and the United States figured in the meeting between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on the sidelines of the 65th United Nations General Assembly sessions in New York. But a senior US official said the 'superb cooperation and goodwill' between Washington and New Delhi would eclipse these hiccups and would not be a dampener on President Obama's visit.
United States Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Robert Blake, while briefing reporters on the meeting between Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on the sidelines of the 65th United Nations General Assembly in New York, said the issue of direct and complete access to Pakistani American and Lashkar operative David Coleman had not come up at all at these talks.
Contending that the relations with Pakistan had undergone 'transformation," India on Thursday said it had decided to have dialogue after assurance at the level of Pakistan Prime Minister Yusuf Raza Gilani that India's 'core concern' with regard to terrorism would be addressed adequately.
India has said the arrest of Pakistan-origin national in the failed terror attack in New York vindicated its oft-repeated stand that Pakistan is the epicentre of terror activities.
Hitting out at Pakistan, India said on Thursday that its western neighbour was "striving hard to fabricate" evidence to show India was fomenting trouble in Balochistan. External Affairs Minister S M Krishna told the Rajya Sabha that India has conveyed to Pakistan at the highest level that it had no interest in destabilising the neighbouring country.
Pak Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said despite acknowledging at a bilateral meeting in at Sharm-el-Sheikh that dialogue was the only way forward for the two countries, India did not yet appear to be ready.
Taking a serious note of the killing of two Indian fishermen allegedly by the Sri Lankan Navy, India on Tuesday told Colombo that the use of force against them should not be repeated and asked it to take a decision that will not upset bilateral ties. External Affairs Minister S M Krishna also directed Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao to convene a meeting of the Indo-Sri Lanka Joint Working Group on the issue around February 15 to discuss the issue.
With India's patience running out, External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on Thursday asked his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi about the progress into the Mumbai terror attacks case and sought a quicker trial."I made enquiries about the progress they (Pakistan) have made about bringing to justice those who were responsible for the attack in Mumbai," said Krishna about his meeting with Qureshi in Kabul.
External Affairs Minister S M Krishna on Tuesday expressed happiness over media reports that Indian investigating agencies would get direct access to David Coleman Headley, the man charged with scouting targets for the 2008 Mumbai attacks.
China is facing a competition, not with India, but between two ideologies within its own country.
India said on Tuesday that China had been showing "more than the normal interest" in the Indian Ocean affairs and its "intentions" are being closely monitored.
India on Tuesday announced an additional $ 20 million assistance to Pakistan which is grappling with the worst floods in recent history of the region.
India on Wednesday inked an agreement with China to set up a hotline between Prime Ministers of the two countries as it conveyed its serious concerns to the Chinese leadership over Beijing's issuance of stapled visas to Kashmiris and plans to undertake projects in Pakistan occupied Kashmir.
In the backdrop of External Affairs Minister SM Krishna's visit to China, The two countries have signed an agreement on Wednesday to establish a hot line facility between the two prime ministers.
The reaction came a day after Pakistan's Interior Minister Rehman Malik said that India is providing funds for Taliban fighters located along the Afghanistan border for creating chaos in Pakistan.
India on Monday rejected the charge that it was fomenting unrest in Pakistan by funding Taliban fighters based along the border with Afghanistan.
With Copenhagen summit providing India and China the much-needed turn around in their relations after a public spat over Arunachal Pradesh, the two sides will try to use External Affairs Minister S M Krishna's April 5 visit to firm up the understanding and not let tensions return to haunt their ties.