Ahead of next week's India-Pak foreign secretary-level talks, the new Indian High Commissioner Satyabrata Pal on Saturday left for New Delhi to brief the Indian leadership on his informal discussions with top foreign ministry officials in Islamabad.
Pal, who took over his new posting on November 1 met Pakistan's Foreign Secretary Riaz Mohammad Khan and other officials and held discussions with them during the past few days on the broad agenda for the talks to be held in New Delhi on November 14-15.
He said he hoped to have a higher level interaction with Pakistan leadership after he formally presents his credentials to President Pervez Musharraf.
Pal said the secretary-level talks would primarily focus on the resumption of dialogue process that had stalled following the Mumbai bomb blasts.
Besides reviewing progress on the third round of the Composite Dialogue process, the two sides would strive to provide shape and substance to the joint mechanism on terrorism agreed in principle at the Havana meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President Pervez Musharraf, Pal, who would be taking part in the talks along with Foreign Secretary, Shiv Shankar Menon said.
Meanwhile, Pakistan held a high-level inter-ministerial meeting to review and finalise strategy to adopted on the gamut of issues figuring in the Composite Dialogue process.
Musharraf will give a directive on Pakistan's stand on crucial issues like proposals exchanged between the two countries to resolve Kashmir issue, Siachen and Sir Creek based on the results of the back-channel talks between the two countries.
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