Islamabad, May 20
On the eve of foreign ministerial level talks between India and Pakistan scheduled to open here on Wednesday, the latter has announced the release of 99 Indian fishermen detained for illegally encroaching into Pakistani waters.
Foreign secretaries of the two countries - Pakistan’s Salman Rashid and India’s Shivshankar Menon - today led the official teams of their respective countries to lay down agenda for talks between Shah Mahmood Qureshi and Indian external affairs minister Pranab Mukherjee.
India voiced its concern over several incidents of firing by Pakistani troops along the Line of Control, (LoC) following which Islamabad gave an assurance that it is committed to maintaining the ceasefire along the frontiers in Jammu and Kashmir.
“Both sides made it clear that they attach great importance to the ceasefire and they want to make it hold,” Shiv Shankar Menon said after talks. Menon said the matter had also been taken up by the directors-general of Military Operations of the two countries and both sides are committed to maintaining the ceasefire which came into force in November 2003.
The eight-point agenda of the talks on Tuesday included confidence-building measures, Kashmir, Siachen, Sir Creek, Wullar Barrage, anti-terrorism and anti-narcotics, economic cooperation and bilateral exchanges. Both sides welcomed marked reduction in mutual tension and hoped this would lead to mutual prosperity and
progress.
