Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan made the suggestion in a letter sent to his Indian counterpart, Narendra Modi, on September 14, 2018.
India has accepted an offer of talks on the sidelines of the coming United Nations General Assembly meeting made by Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan.
“We have decided that the meeting will be held [between Minister for External Affairs Sushma Swaraj and her Pakistani counterpart Shah Mehmood Qureshi]”, said a spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) in New Delhi.
“Building on the mutual desire for peace our two countries, I wish to propose a meeting between Foreign Minister, Makhdoom Shah Mahmood Qureshi and the External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, before the informal meeting of the SAARC Foreign Ministers at the sidelines of the upcoming UN General Assembly in New York,” Mr. Khan said in a letter sent on September 14, 2018, to his Indian counterpart Narendra Modi.
Mr. Modi had written to Mr. Khan congratulating him on being sworn in as Prime Minister. Sources in the Government of India said on Wednesday that Ms. Swaraj’s schedule was yet to be finalised even though she was expected to participate in the SAARC ministerial meeting.
The dialogue process between the two sides has not moved ahead since the Comprehensive Bilateral Dialogue failed to take off after the January 2016 Pathankot terror strike. India has since maintained that talks will be held only if a conducive environment for talks is fostered by Pakistan. Minister of State for External Affairs V.K. Singh reiterated the same this week.
The New York meeting, once firmed up, would be the first meeting between the ministers of both sides since the swearing in of Mr. Khan. Since the arrival of the new government, Mr. Qureshi has carried out several trips to important capitals in the region in search of building working relationships.