Pakistan, India need to build trust: Kasuri

New Delhi—India and Pakistan need to develop trust as their relations are very important, Pakistan Foreign Minister Khurshid Mehmood Kasuri said here Monday after his meeting with External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee.
After the informal luncheon meeting with Mukherjee, Kasuri said he was happy to see a senior Congress leader in charge of External Affairs Ministry as it would help in the task that the two sides are engaged in.
“We both agreed that India-Pakistan relations are very important. We need to develop trust,” Kasuri told reporters with Mukherjee standing by his side. Mukherjee will travel to Pakistan on January 13 to invite President Pervez Musharraf for the SAARC summit to be held here in early April and hold “substantive talks” with Kasuri.
“Both of us agreed that Pakistan-India relations were very important and that we needed to develop a level of trust,” Mr. Kasuri said as he talked to the media along with Mr. Mukherjee after a lunch the latter hosted for him. “I told him that I had developed trust with his two predecessors and I was looking forward to developing similar trust with him (Mukherjee), the Pakistani foreign minister said. Mr. Mukherjee said that this was not a formal visit of his Pakistani counterpart and that he would have the privilege of receiving him during the next SAARC Summit.
Pakistan’s High Commissioner to India Aziz Ahmad Khan also attended the lunch. Mr. Mukherjee said he would go to Islamabad on January 13 and carry Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s letter inviting President Pervez Musharraf to the 14th SAARC Summit to be held in Delhi.
“We will have some substantive talks at that point of time,” the Indian external affairs minister said, adding that he would call on President Pervez Musharraf during his visit to Pakistan. Mr. Kasuri said he was happy that a very senior leader of the Congress party was Incharge of the ministry of external affairs.
“It gives me a great hope because whatever we have to do it requires peoples and politicians who are strong and after my meeting today I have greater hope,” he said. Mr. Kasuri said he looked forward to receiving Mr. Mukherjee in Islamabad on in January 13. “We agreed on the date and I assured him of very warm welcome.”
Earlier, Mr Kasuri met the former Indian external affairs minister K. Natwar Singh. He is here on a private visit to attend the wedding ceremony of the daughter of Union Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar. By and large all the major Indian Dailies today prominently splashed the engagements of Pakistan’s Foreign Minister Khurshid Mahmud Kasuri with coloured picture on the front page notwithstanding that it was a private visit.
Electronic and print media extensively covered the arrival and other engagements of the visiting dignitary, accompanied by his wife and Director General (South Asia) Jalil Abbas Jilani. The Minister is here to attend the wedding ceremony of the daughter of Union Minister Mani Shankar Aiyar. Various Indian news channels carried the interviews of Mr Kasuri with focus on Indo-Pak relations and bilateral issues including Kashmir, Siachen and anti-terror mechanism.—Agencies