PM Modi phoned Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif while on a visit to neighbouring Afghanistan and asked if he could make a stop in Pakistan on his way home, Pakistani foreign secretary Aizaz Chaudhry told media after Modi departed.
“And the Pak PM said to him, ‘Please come, you are our guest, please come and have tea with me’,” he said.
It was Sharif’s 66th birthday and the family home was festooned with lights for his grand-daughter’s wedding on Saturday. Modi and Sharif talked for about 90 minutes and shared an early-evening meal before the Indian leader flew back home.
Pakistani Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry told reporters in Lahore the “goodwill visit” as pleasant and said the two leaders needed “to understand each other to open the doors of peace and stability in South Asia.
Modi and Sharif talked about restarting a dialogue and increasing people-to-people contacts between their nations, he said.
The foreign secretaries of both counties are to meet in Islamabad at the end of the month, Chaudhry said.It was the first time an Indian prime minister has visited Pakistan in almost 12 years.
The visit is a hopeful sign after the off-and-on talks between India and Pakistan, which suffered some setbacks in 2015.
In August, talks were canceled over an agenda conflict, only to have the national security advisers of both countries meet recently for surprise dialogue in Bangkok, Thailand.
This month, Indian External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj also visited the Pakistani capital of Islamabad, signaling a further ease in bilateral ties.
“Prime Minister Modi has once again proved his critics, who call him a Hindu hardliner, wrong by his unconventional style and by leading India’s foreign policy from the front,” said K.G. Suresh, a senior fellow at the New Delhi-based Vivekananda International Foundation, which was founded by Ajit Doval, India’s national security adviser. “The ice has been broken.”
Suresh added, “This short visit has raised hopes high for peace and prosperity in South Asia.”
Sharif, who attended Modi’s inauguration as prime minister last year, invited his Indian counterpart to Pakistan when they met in Russia in July.
In a joint statement, they expressed Modi’s commitment to attend a South Asian summit next year.
Relations between India and Pakistan have been strained over a series of cross-border firing
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