ISLAMABAD, 23 December 2005 — Pakistan and India will resume their bilateral talks on Jan. 17 in the Indian capital New Delhi, official sources told Arab News here yesterday.
Foreign secretaries of Pakistan and India Riaz Mohammad Khan and Shayam Saran, respectively, will pick the threads from where they had left during last officials talks.
Important issues like crossing points on the Line of Control, opening of the Monabao-Khokhrapaar rail link ,and preliminary talks on proposed self-governance in both sides of Kashmir will figure at the talks.
The idea of self-governance and demilitarization of Kashmir is being opposed by some leaders of Indian-controlled Kashmir and by the leaders of Pakistan-administered Kashmir including former president of Azad Kashmir Sardar Abdul Qayyum Khan.
The idea of the demilitarization of Kashmir and making the Line of Control was initially floated by President Gen. Pervez Musharraf during his interview with Arab News Editor-in-Chief Khaled Almaeena during an exclusive interview during last Ramadan.
Pakistan and India have also agreed during a recent meeting of the officials from the two countries to begin a new cross-border bus service from next month.
The bus route will link Lahore with Amritsar. The two countries have also announced a separate bus service route to facilitate the Sikh community of India. The route will be Amritsar to Nankana Sahib. Many Sikhs regularly visit Nankana Sahib and Punja Sahib. A trial run of the Amritsar and Nankana Sahib will be on Jan. 27.
Seven Killed in Gunbattle in Pakistani Border Region
Meanwhile, seven people were killed in a gunbattle in a tribal region near the Afghan border as militants raided homes searching for rivals, residents and a representative of the militants said yesterday, according to agencies.
More than 30 people have died this month alone in clashes between the militants, who call themselves Taleban like Afghanistan’s former hard-line rulers, and rivals they have branded bandits in the remote North Waziristan tribal region.
A representative of the militants, many of whom are religious students, said five bandits and two Taleban were killed in the remote Shawal area after the raids on several fortress-like tribal homes on Wednesday.
Government officials declined to comment but travelers from the area, to the west of the region’s main town of Miranshah, confirmed the latest fighting.
Two bullet-riddled bodies were found in a stream on the outskirts of Miranshah yesterday.
One of the men was a retired junior officer of the paramilitary Frontier Corps, the other was a friend, a local official said.
