Meeting of India’s and Pakistan’s foreign secretaries scheduled in February

NEW DELHI: Nirupama Rao Indian foreign secretary is likely to meet her Pakistani counterpart in Bhutan’s capital next month, India’s foreign office said on Sunday, as the two nuclear-armed neighbours try to take forward a stalled peace process.

The ties between the two South Asian countries plummeted after the 2008 Mumbai attacks which killed 166 people and derailed a sluggish four-year-old peace process with Pakistan.

The meeting is likely to take place on the margins of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) standing committee meeting at Thimphu on February 6-7, the foreign office statement said.

Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna said Last week he expects his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi to visit India by March.

(News Editor- Naushin Fatima Khan)