Indian, Pakistani premiers to meet in bid to defuse tensions
MOSCOW. July 16. KAZINFORM Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is to meet with his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani on Thursday for talks aimed at calming tensions between the two nuclear states; Kazinform cites RIA Novosti.
The meeting will take place on the sidelines of a Non-Aligned Movement summit of leaders of developing countries in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.
Relations between the two nuclear powers countries deteriorated after last November's attacks on the Indian city of Mumbai. India has blamed the Pakistani-based Lashkar-e-Taiba movement for the assault by heavily-armed terrorists, and has said it wants to see a "visible response" from Islamabad.
"Both India and Pakistan are really keen to begin talks, to begin the peace process," International Institute for Strategic Studies South Asia analyst Rahul Roy-Chaudhury told RIA Novosti.
"But from the Indian side there are constraints, the most important of these is what India calls the requirement for visible action by the Pakistani government against the Lashkar-e-Taiba, or the Jamaat-ud-Dawa, the organization that India holds responsible for the attack on Mumbai," Roy-Chaudhury went on.
Jamaat-ud-Dawa, registered as a charity in Pakistan, is widely believed to be a front for the militant Lashkar-e-Taiba group.
India and Pakistan have fought three wars since 1947. A 2001-2002 military standoff saw both countries amass troops in the Kashmir region; Kazinform refers to RIA Novosti.
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