Aziz: Peace date

Islamabad, July 22: Shaukat Aziz, who takes over as Prime Minister next month, has added to the bonhomie between Islamabad and Delhi with plans to visit India in the next few months.

The promise to visit Delhi came in the backdrop of foreign minister Natwar Singh reaffirming the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance government’s commitment “not only to continue with the peace process but to carry it forward”.

The dates for the visit are to be finalised, but Aziz — who will take over as Prime Minister on August 18 after the National Assembly approves his name — can journey to India any time between September and October.

As the outgoing chairman of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation, Aziz will visit neighbouring countries and he has said India will be the first stop in his travel programme.

However, even as the bonhomie between the two countries continued, members of a delegation led by Singh to the Pakistan capital are keeping their fingers crossed on the outcome of tomorrow’s meeting between the foreign minister and President Pervez Musharraf.

Assurances by Pakistani officials of normalising relations with India do not discount that Musharraf, who calls the shots in the country and the extent to which Islamabad will want to travel with Delhi on the peace track, will decide on his response only after his meeting with Singh.

Pakistan foreign minister Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri assured Singh yesterday at a breakfast meeting that his government was committed to the peace process.

Singh and Kasuri have decided to meet between September 5 and 6 — after the composite dialogue between the two sides at the end of August — to try and resolve all outstanding issues, including Kashmir.

Kasuri assured Singh that his government would continue the peace process beyond September. “We hope there will be continuity and greater progress after we meet in Delhi,” Kasuri said yesterday after the nearly two-hour-long meeting with the Indian foreign minister.

Islamabad’s main complaint about the new dispensation in India is that it is not sure who calls the shots in Delhi now.

This evening, the Indian foreign minister tried to address this after his meeting with Aziz by saying: “Now Pakistan is reassured that India will not only continue the dialogue process but carry it forward.”