India Pakistan NSA level talks called off after after both sides fail to break the deadlock
The curtains came down by Saturday night on the dramatic spectacle around holding India-Pakistan talks, less than a day before Pakistan’s National Security Adviser Sartaj Aziz was due to land in New Delhi, with bitter accusations and acrimony marking the exchanges.
Pakistan accused India of “concocting terror incidents and keeping the LoC [Line of Control] hot”, while India said Pakistan was using firing at the LoC and terror attacks to “run away from the talks”.
Pakistan has carefully analyzed the contents of the Press Conference of the Indian Minister for External Affairs, Sushma Sawaraj this afternoon. “We have come to the conclusion that the proposed NSA level talks between the two countries would not serve any purpose, if conducted on the basis of the two conditions laid down by the Minister,” the Pakistan Foreign Ministry noted in a statement.
While the Indian Minister accepts that, to ensure durable peace between the two countries, there is a need to discuss all outstanding issues through a sustained dialogue process, started in 1998 as Composite Dialogue and renamed as Resumed Dialogue in 2011, she then unilaterally restricts the agenda to only two items: creating an atmosphere free from terrorism and tranquility on the LoC.
The United states meanwhile has said it was “disappointed” that the proposed talks between the National Security Advisors of India and Pakistan has been called off.
“We are disappointed the talks will not happen this weekend and encourage India and Pakistan to resume formal dialogue soon,” state department spokesperson John Kirby told PTI on Saturday.
