Paris: Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon meets his Pakistani counterpart on Tuesday to lay the ground for talks between the two Prime Ministers later this week but a 36-page “dossier” handed over by Islamabad to New Delhi on the action it has taken in connection with the 26/11 Mumbai attack isn’t expected to give an immediate boost as it needs to be studied and verified by experts.
The dossier was handed over by the Pak Foreign Ministry to acting Indian High Commission Manpreet Vohra late on Saturday night and also contains some questions and additional information.Pak agencies want in connection with the Lashkar-e-Toiba men blamed for the Mumbai attack.
They are also believed to have sought copies of documents that form part of the chargesheet filed in thecase by the Mumbai police.
On the face of it, it appears like Pakistan has taken some action but what they amount to is still tobe judged and would require “professional opinion,” possibly from legal experts and investigative and intelligence agencies, sources said.
That being New Delhi’s position, Menon’s meeting with Salman Bashir soon after the former lands in the Egyptian Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh late tomorrow evening, will see the onus remaining on Pakistan to convey to India what progress it has made not only in connection with the Mumbai attacks but also the larger question of dismantling the terror infrastructure.
Menon and National Security Advisor M K Narayanan are traveling with Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh to Paris for the French National Day celebrations tomorrow from where they move on to Sharm el-Sheikh for the 15th Summit of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM). Singh is due to hold talks with Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani on Thursday morning.
The talks between the two Foreign Secretaries and the Prime Ministers is yet another
step that hopes to help resume the peace process, suspended after the attack on the Indian
Embassy in Kabul last year.
However, India remains adamant about the need for concrete action from
Pakistan to address New Delhi’s concerns and the past will not be dumped for
history to repeat itself, the sources said. As a result, India is not thinking ahead
of itself and has adopted a wait-and-watch attitude, clearly not in a position to
take a stand on whether the composite dialogue should resume or not.
In fact, some sections in the establishment feel that the two countries are “far away”...
