India didn't reciprocate Pakistan's efforts for good ties: Nawaz Sharif

MANAMA: Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif today said his "sincere efforts" to improve relations with India were not reciprocated by the new Indian Government.

Addressing a gathering of overseas Pakistanis in the capital city of Bahrain, where he is on a two-day official visit, Sharif said India cancelled the Foreign Secretary-level talks last year with Pakistan "on the pretext" of the Pakistani High Commissioner's meeting with Kashmiri separatist leaders, which he said "had been a practice for 60 years."

Underlining that Pakistan desires good relations with all its neighbours, he said, "We made sincere efforts to improve relations with the new government in India, but the efforts were not reciprocated."

On the anti-terrorism operations in Pakistan, Sharif said that terrorism would be eliminated from the country and the Zarb-i-Azb offensive will continue until militancy was crushed, Radio Pakistan reported.

He said the military operation was launched in North Waziristan after exhaustion of the option of talks with militants, which could not succeed because the terrorists were not ready to lay down their arms.

He said the operation has yielded encouraging results with several terrorists killed and several others fled to Afghanistan.