ISLAMABAD: Foreign secretary-level talks between Pakistan and India are not conditional to the Pathankot airbase attack probe, said the Indian High Commissioner Gautam Bambawaly on Monday.
The Indian envoy told media here that both the countries were in constant contact to hold foreign secretary-level talks in the near future. “I cannot give any particular date for the secretary-level talks, but foreign secretaries from both the countries are in constant contact,” he said.
After a series of high-level contacts starting with an ice-breaking meeting in Paris between Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi and climaxing with the latter’s surprise trip to Lahore, Pakistan and India had agreed in December to resume the bilateral dialogue after a hiatus of two years because of tensions along the Line of Control (LoC) and the Working Boundary. The resumed dialogue was named Comprehensive Bilateral Dialogue and it was agreed that the foreign secretaries of the two countries would meet on Jan 15 this year to decide about the timetable and modalities of the process.
India blamed the attack on Pathankot airbase on Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Muhammad. It linked the resumption of the foreign secretary-level to action by Pakistan against the group.
In a high-level meeting, presided over by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and attended by General Raheel Sharif, Pakistan reiterated its commitment to cooperate with India on the Pathankot incident.
A special investigation team set up by Pakistan to probe the deadly assault last month found no evidence implicating the leader of the group India blamed for the attack, Pakistani security officials said last week.
Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif had said the government wanted to send a team of special investigators to the Pathankot airbase in India for further investigation, and to probe any possible involvement of Pakistan-based individuals.
Meanwhile, Indian media quoting officials reported on Monday that the National Investigation Agency (NIA) had decided to preserve the bodies of the four terrorists killed in an encounter at the Pathankot airbase for an ‘indefinite period’ as it made preparations to hand over their photographs to Pakistan.
Before it decided to send the photographs, the NIA rummaged through the database of all missing persons in India aged 18-35 to establish whether they were Indians or not, reports added. “We went through the records and made enquiries to see whether these terrorists were Indians or not. We found nothing to that effect and now have plans to hand them over to Pakistan to seek their help in identifying the four men,” the official said.
