US pushes Islamabad, Delhi for talks progress

NEW DELHI—The United States leaned on India and Pakistan on Friday to work together against terrorism and urged the South Asian rivals to seek progress as they resume peace talks next week.
The comments by U.S. Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia, Richard Boucher, came days before senior officials of India and Pakistan hold talks in New Delhi to push a peace process that had stalled after the July 11 Mumbai train blasts. Indian Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon is due to meet his Pakistani counterpart, Riaz Mohammad Khan, on November 14 and 15 to discuss among other things, a joint system the two countries have agreed to set up to tackle terrorism. “I hope these can be positive discussions,” Boucher told a news conference after talks with Indian officials.
“What needs to be done is ... to try to achieve some progress on the issues and I am confident that both sides are getting together to try to achieve progress on issues, to try to work together against terrorism,” he said. Peace talks between the nuclear-armed neighbours were launched in 2004 after intense global pressure, led by the United States, forced them to pull back from the brink of a war following an attack on Indian parliament blamed on Pakistan-based Islamist militants.
But Washington has not been publicly involved in mediating between the two countries, with India averse to international intervention in what it sees as a regional dispute. The India-Pakistan negotiations made slow progress until New Delhi suspended talks this year after blaming a Pakistan-based Islamist militant group for the July 11 Mumbai train bombings in which at least 186 people were killed. The two sides agreed to restart the process after Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Pervez Musharraf held talks on the sidelines of a Non-Aligned Movement summit in Havana in September. The two leaders also agreed to set up a joint counter-terrorism system to share information and follow-up on attacks in either country.
Boucher said Washington hoped that the India-Pakistan joint mechanism to tackle terrorism would prove useful. Many Indian analysts have dismissed the mechanism saying they did not expect Islamabad to act against its own spy agency which New Delhi blames for subversive acts across the country. “We hope that the mechanism ... produces outcomes that are important not just for political relations for the governments but produces outcomes that can help stop the terrorism that hurts people,” Boucher said.
“And we hope they can make progress on some of the big political issues that stand between India and Pakistan.” However, Boucher added that he did not expect the two rivals, who have fought three wars in the last six decades, to make real progress in just one round of talks and that a whole series of discussions were needed to achieve that. Fresh violence in Kashmir underlined the pressure the peace process faced. Four people were killed and 35 wounded in two separate grenade attacks by suspected militants in the region.
Agencies Add: India and Pakistan will hold two-day Foreign-Secretary level talks here on November 14-15 and review the progress made on issues including Kashmir problem in the third round of Composite Dialogue. Leading a Pakistan’s delegation, Foreign Secretary Riaz Mohammad Khan will arrive here on Monday to hold parleys with his Indian counterpart Shiv Shankar Menon. During the two-day talks, both sides are also expected to give shape to the joint anti-terror mechanism, which they have decided to set up.
Other members of Pak delegation include Additional Secretary (AP) Akhtar Tufail, High Commissioner-designate to India Shahid Malik, Director General (South Asia) Jalil Abbas Jilani, Spokesperson of the Foreign Office Tasneem Aslam and Director Foreign Office Raja Zaheer.—Agencies