New York: The status of investigations being carried out by Pakistan into Mumbai attacks case on Saturday came up for a thorough review as Foreign Secretaries of the two countries met in New York, setting the stage for the Foreign Ministerial meeting on Sunday.
Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao and her Pakistani counterpart Salman Bashir held nearly two-hour-long discussions, amid India's keenness to see Pakistan act speedily and in a transparent manner against those responsible for the heinous attack on 26/11.
During the meeting, Rao is understood to have sought to know what actions Pakistan had taken to bring to justice those responsible for the Mumbai attacks, including Jamaat-ud Dawa chief Hafiz Saeed.
"We had a useful exchange of views," Rao told reporters after her one-on-one and delegation-level talks with Bashir on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly.
"We talked about the meeting between our two ministers as you know that is being planned for tomorrow," she said without giving any details of the discussions.
Bashir also said that the focus of their discussions was Sunday's meeting between External Affairs Minister S M Krishna and his Pakistani counterpart Shah Mahmood Qureshi.
At the meeting, Bashir gave a detailed account of the steps taken by Pakistan to prosecute the seven persons who have been held in connection with the 26/11 attacks besides the efforts to arrest the other 11 absconding people.
The meeting between Rao and Bashir marked the first high-level contact between the two countries since the Prime Ministers of the two countries met at Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, on July 16.
It came amid India's disappointment over the tardy progress of Pakistan's probe into the Mumbai attacks and its prosecution of those involved in the heinous attacks which have led to the suspension of composite dialogue.
India has been expressing dissatisfaction at the "tardy" steps by Pakistan and has been particularly peeved over the freedom allowed by Pakistan to Hafiz Mohd Saeed despite ample proof of his role in masterminding the Mumbai attack.
While Pakistan has been claiming that enough proof had not been provided, India has been asserting that "concrete and cogent" evidence had been given in six dossiers that would stand in any court of law.
Rao and Bashir will report about their discussions to their foreign ministers.
Ahead of the meeting, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh made it clear that Pakistan must stop using terrorism as an instrument of policy if it wanted normal relations with India.
During their meeting at Sharm el-Sheikh, Singh and his Pakistani counterpart Yusuf Raza Gilani had decided that their Foreign Secretaries would meet as often as necessary and report to the two Foreign Ministers.
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