New Delhi : Since there was no official confirmation from Islamabad of the detention of Jaish chief Masood Azhar till night-time. The decision on the Foreign Secretary level talks with Pakistan, which have been hanging in the lurch in view of the lack of concrete action on the ground, has been put on hold until Thursday.
National Security Adviser Ajit Doval is returning from Paris tomorrow and brief the PM on his discussions with Pakistani counterpart Naseer Januja. The two NSAs had hush-hush talks at an undisclosed location either at Paris or in Dubai.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is reportedly amenable to the idea of keeping the window open for talks at even a later date as he does not want to undermine the rapport he has established with Nawaz Sharif.
He held a lengthy discussion at his residence on Wednesday night with External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar and they concurred that they have nothing to act on except for a statement issued by the Pakistan PMO; nor had they got any official communication
on the detention of JeM chief Masood Azhar and others. So, a decision was taken not to rush with cancellation of the talks but to wait till Thursday morning for a report from the NSA and the new High Commissioner Gautam Bambawale who had a meeting with Pakistan foreign secretary in Islamabad on Wednesday.
Jaishankar, who flew back to Delhi from a foreign trip, had an hour-long meeting in the night with Swaraj at her residence after getting a briefing from his office on developments in Islamabad. He was later taken to the PM’s house by her for a final decision on the talks.
Jaishankar was supposed to leave on Friday for Islamabad to hold talks with his Pakistani counterpart. Together, they will chalk out a roadmap to carry forward the engagement under the newly-announced “Bilateral Comprehensive Dialogue.”
Earlier in the day, Pakistan asked India not to derail the foreign secretary-level talks slated in Islamabad. The PMO in Islamabad put out a detailed 5-page statement on the detention of “several individuals” belonging to the banned outfit Jaish-e-Mohammad. It also offered to rush a Special Investigation Team to Pathankot for better coordination to nail the culprits.
The PMO statement was issued after a high-level review meeting chaired by Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif urged Prime Minister Modi to ensure Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar leaves for Islamabad on Friday.
The talks were under a cloud all day with Indian Army chief General Dalbir Singh Suhag sounding quite hawkish: he even blamed the Pakistan Army for derailing the peace process a “number of times” in the past.
He was addressing his annual press conference ahead of the Army Day. The Army chief also refused to comment on the fate of the foreign secretary-level talks, saying it was a diplomatic and political decision.
