Nuclear rivals India and Pakistan began talks yesterday on drug trafficking, terrorism and the status of nationals jailed in each other's prisons as part of their ongoing peace process, an Indian official said.
The talks between the two countries' home secretaries (top interior ministry officials) follow meetings earlier this month on nuclear issues, conventional warfare and cross-border trade.
They form part of the so-called Composite Dialogue launched in January last year and aimed at resolving decades-old conflicts, including the one over Kashmir.
"Usually the agenda is terrorism and drug trafficking but this time we have requested that we would like to discuss the issue of prisoners held in both countries," Pakistani home secretary Syed Kamal Shah told reporters Sunday.
He said the 11-member Pakistani delegation had come to India with a "positive and open mind."
Shah's Indian counterpart V.K. Duggal confirmed yesterday that New Delhi had agreed to talk about the fate of prisoners.
The subject assumed prominence after Pakistan's Supreme Court this month confirmed a death sentence on Indian national Sarabjit Singh for allegedly masterminding bomb blasts in the northern Pakistani city of Lahore -- raising a storm of protest in India.
Pakistan says Singh is an Indian spy who carried out the 1990 bomb attacks but his family says he is a farmer who crossed the border while he was drunk and has urged Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf to grant him clemency.
India will also take up the cases of all Indians in Pakistani jails, a home ministry official said. India says there are 1,348 Indians in Pakistani prisons while Pakistan says more than 700 of its nationals are in Indian jails.
Besides the issue of detainees, Duggal said New Delhi would press Islamabad to deport "terrorists" who committed crimes in India and then took refuge in Pakistan, including mafia don Dawood Ibrahim.
New Delhi accuses Ibrahim of masterminding 1993 serial bomb blasts in India's commercial capital Mumbai which left hundreds dead.
India will also ask for the deportation of Maulana Masood Azhar and Hafiz Sayed who head the Jaish-e-Mohammad and Lashkar-e-Taiba militant groups respectively, media reports yesterday quoted Duggal as saying.
The two groups are among many battling Indian security forces in the disputed region of Kashmir.
New Delhi will ask Islamabad to dismantle what it says are "terrorist training camps" in its territories, including its portion of Kashmir, Duggal told Zee Television.
India accuses Pakistan of training Islamic rebels to bolster the rebellion in Indian-administered Kashmir, a charge it denies.
"During the talks, the Indian side will raise security concerns and urge upon the Pakistani side to widen cooperation in combating the menace of terrorism," an Indian home ministry statement said.
It added that both sides would make efforts to "expedite the finalization and signing of [an agreement] ... to have a regular institutional mechanism in place on drug control matters."
On Sept. 1 top foreign ministry officials from both countries will meet in Islamabad. This could pave the way for a possible meeting between Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Pakistan's President Pervez Muharraf on the sidelines of the UN summit in New York later next month.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in