Sushma Swaraj, Sartaj Aziz to meet in Nepal this week

New Delhi: Pakistan Prime Minister’s Advisor on foreign affairs Sartaj Aziz will meet external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj on the sidelines of the Saarc council of  ministers’ meeting on Thursday in Nepal to extend Pakistan PM Nawaz Sharif’s formal invitation to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the 19th Saarc Summit that will be hosted by Pakistan in Islamabad later this year.

Prime Minister Modi is expected to travel to  Pakistan for that Summit in November this year. The government sources in New Delhi confirmed that Mr. Aziz and Ms. Swaraj would meet on Thursday on the sidelines of the  meeting in Nepal. India’s foreign secretary S. Jaishankar may also meet his Pakistani counterpart in an informal meeting.

India is once again likely to make it clear to Pakistan at the meeting between Mr. Aziz and Ms. Swaraj that it expects strong action to be taken  against those responsible for planning and executing the Pathankot terror strike from Pakistani soil. The meeting is somewhat bound to break the ice between the political leadership of the two countries after the Pathankot terror  strike in January this year, although the NSAs of the two countries have been in touch on the matter.

The MEA has also maintained that the foreign secretaries of the two countries have also been in touch. Foreign Secretary-level talks between the two countries had been postponed in the wake of the Pathankot terror attack and have yet to be re-scheduled. As reported  earlier, India will wait for the outcome of the proposed visit by the Pakistani SIT — probing the conspiracy on Pakistani soil by Pakistan-based militants of the JeM that led to the Pathankot terror strike — to India before taking a decision on scheduling the FS-level talks.

Pakistan, in a statement issued, said, “The Advisor to the Prime Minister on foreign affairs, Mr. Sartaj Aziz, will meet foreign ministers of Saarc countries on the sidelines of the Saarc Council of Ministers’ meeting on March 17, 2016, in Nepal to extend PM Nawaz Sharif’s formal invitation to their respective Heads of  State/Heads of Government for the 19th Saarc Summit, being hosted by Pakistan in  Islamabad this year.” This will be Modi’s second visit to Pakistan if he eventually goes for the SAARC Summit.