India, Pakistan hold talks on trade, LoC bus

NEW DELHI: Despite National Security Advisor M K Narayanan blaming the ISI for the terror attack on the Indian mission in Kabul, India and Pakistan held negotiations to boost trade and increase the frequency of cross LoC bus service.

After cancelling one bilateral meeting at the beginning of the week to protest against Pakistan���s suspected involvement in the terror attack in Afghanistan, India decided to go ahead with trade talks and foreign secretary-level talks.

Interestingly, the meeting of foreign secretaries is now being held on July 22, the day the government faces a trust vote. At the trade talks, which were led by MEA joint secretary T C A Raghavan and director-general (South Asia & SAARC) Aizaz Ahmed Chaudhry, the two sides discussed the modalities for implementing the decisions that were taken in May by foreign ministers of the two countries, according to a joint statement.

The two sides looked at the modalities of increasing the frequency of Muzaffarabad-Srinagar and Rawalkot-Poonch bus services from a fortnightly to a weekly. New Delhi is hoping to improve ties with Islamabad by making progress on issues like trade and economic cooperation.

These trade and cross LoC movement issues will be taken up at the next at the meeting of foreign secretaries in Delhi on Tuesday. The foreign secretaries are meeting to launch the next round of the composite dialogue process.

In spite of the terror attack on the Kabul mission in which two diplomats were killed, the establishment clearly wants to show Pakistan and the world that it will continue with the composite dialogue process and push other areas of cooperation like trade.

Hardliners in India are against holding talks with Pakistan following the Kabul blast which is suspected to be the handiwork of ISI.