Pak made no suggestions to India on NY talks: Krishna

NEW YORK: External Affairs Minister S M Krishna today categorically denied receiving any "suggestions" from Pakistan to make Indo-Pak talks more "meaningful".

"We have not received any of those suggestions," Krishna said, referring to Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi's remark that Islamabad had sent New Delhi suggestions through diplomatic channels to make the talks more meaningful.

Krishna and Qureshi were both in New York to attend the opening session of the United Nations General Assembly and a bilateral meeting was widely anticipated.

An Indo-Pak bilateral, which was being explored for this week, did not materialised and both sides have faulted each other for it.

Earlier this week, Qureshi told the media that "the talks can take place immediately if a positive response is received (from India)."

Qureshi insisted that Pakistan wanted all issues to be discussed during talks, which he had pointed out differs from India's approach of "graduated" talks that would focus on Mumbai attacks and terrorism and then explore other issues like Kashmir.

Pointing to disputes over Kashmir, Siachen and water, Qureshi had said, "How can Pakistan talk to India without these subjects being on the table."

"Well apart from Kashmir there are a lot of issues where they could be agreement," Krishna said, adding "India still holds the view that a graduated approach to the Indo-Pak talks is more rational, more reasonable and I think we should attempt that."

Krishna further noted that during the July talks in Islamabad both countries had been able to find common ground on "a number of other humanitarian issues... But there are core issues where they have been very strong positions, which have been held but that doesn't prevent normalisation of relations between the two countries."

Despite the spat over Kashmir here in New York, both ministers have said that they look forward to the next round of talks in New Delhi for which dates have to be set through diplomatic channels.

During their time in New York, Qureshi and Krishna repeatedly described their meeting in Islamabad as productive.