Foreign secretary-level talks with Pakistan put off

Pakistan foreign ministry declines to confirm JeM’s chief

GN Staff | January 14, 2016


#pakistan   #jaish   #azar   #terrorist   #pathankot  

Pakistan has blinked first and on Thursday it was in touch with India to reschedule the foreign secretary-level talks slated in Islamabad tomorrow (January 15). This came after a Pakistani foreign ministry spokesperson said he wasn’t aware of Jaish-e-Mohammad chief Maulana Masood Azhar's arrest, as reported in the media.

Foreign secretary S Jaishankar and his Pakistani counterpart Aizaz Ahmed Chowdhury hit a road block  after India sought “prompt and decisive action” by Pakistan based on “actionable intelligence” and evidence gathered in the air base that the JeM as involved.

Not confirming Azhar's detention, Pakistan foreign affairs ministry spokesperson Khalilullah Qazi said, "I am not aware of such arrests. Mutual consultations are on about rescheduling the talks. We have said it often that terrorism is common enemy for all. We have to work together to end it."

On Wednesday, India had deferred a decision on whether to go ahead with the Foreign Secretary-level talks with Pakistan and wanted to take it after NSA Ajit Doval's return from Paris.

Mohammad Zubair, a minister in the Nawaz Sharif government in Pakistan, told an Indian TV channel that he cannot confirm the arrest of Azhar while Lt General (Retired) Abdul Qadir Baloch, minister for frontier regions, said that "Azhar was arrested". Azhar's brother Abdul Rehman Rauf has also been detained, Geo TV said. However, late in the night external affairs ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup said India has received no confirmation of the detention of Azhar.

It came just a week after prime minister Narendra Modi’s surprise stopover in Pakistan on premier Nawaz Sharif’s birthday, hailed as a diplomatic coup that displayed New Delhi’s political intent to meaningfully engage with its neighbour.

Earlier on December 9, Sushma Swaraj became the first Indian foreign minister to visit Pakistan since 2012. She met prime minister Sharif on the sidelines of a conference on Afghanistan, the third bilateral engagement at the top level in less than 10 days after an impromptu and brief meeting between Modi and his Pakistani counterpart in Paris on November 30.

Comments

 

Other News

MoEFCC and CAQM launch ‘The Breath of Change’

To tackle air pollution in Delhi-NCR through public participation and creative engagement, the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEFCC) and the Commission for Air Quality Management (CAQM) have jointly launched a strategic communication campaign titled The Breath of Change.

India well on way to becoming a global IP powerhouse

Intellectual Property (IP) has evolved into a critical component of innovation and global competitiveness in India’s economy. As businesses pivot toward intangible assets like data, algorithms and branding, IP protection is no longer a matter of formality—it is a strategic imperative. The last

War and Peace: The conundrum of conflict in West Asia

Israel and Palestine have been the harbinger of troubles for the last 80-odd years. It is an unending and persistent saga of conflict and attrition which has bloodied the political, societal and economic turf in West Asia for long. The scale of wars, which were more than skirmishes of the day, ranged from

Trump’s tariff ploy sparks resistance from Global South

In the history of BRICS, never has any joint statement issued after a leader-level summit contained any remarks—directly or indirectly, against the US. However, for the first time, during the 17th summit of BRICS in Rio de Janeiro in Brazil, leaders voiced their concern about America’s impositi

How India can become a $30 tn economy by 2047: A blueprint

Viksit Bharat: India @2047  By Aditya Pittie Fingerprint Publishing This timely and meticulously

The saga of a language family that has shaped the world

Proto: How One Ancient Language Went Global By Laura Spinney Distributed in India by HarperCollins India, 352 pages, Rs 599

Visionary Talk: Amitabh Gupta, Pune Police Commissioner with Kailashnath Adhikari, MD, Governance Now





Archives

Current Issue

Opinion

Facebook Twitter Google Plus Linkedin Subscribe Newsletter

Twitter