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 Indian home minister will travel to Pakistan05-02-2010INDIA has proposed foreign secretary-level talks with Pakistan, a senior government source, signalling a major breakthrough in relations frozen since the 2008 attacks in Mumbai. Pakistan's foreign minister welcomed the offer, although he said it was premature to announce a date. The Indian proposal marks a significant shift.
Until now, New Delhi had steadfastly refused a resumption of talks until Islamabad brings those behind the Mumbai attacks to justice and cracks down on militant groups on its soil.
"India will enter these discussions with an open mind," said the Indian government source.
"We will raise all relevant issues from our side. Counter-terrorism will be raised, as well as other issues that will contribute to creating an atmosphere of peace and stability between the two countries."
"Let us not pre-judge the outcome," the source added.
India and Pakistan launched a peace dialogue in 2004 that helped lower tensions between the nuclear-armed South Asian rivals, notably over the disputed region of Kashmir.
But that was broken off after the November 2008 attacks by Islamist gunmen on Mumbai that killed 166 people and which India blamed on the Pakistan-based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) militant group.
Observers said foreign secretary-level talks would not amount to a resumption of the full-scale dialogue initiated in 2004, but they would be a step in that direction.
Pakistani Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi (pictured) told private television channel Geo: "We wish that talks start and be positive and I wish we could start from the point where it was broken.
"The real thing is the political will and today they have shown the political will and now going forward is possible.
"We are also trying to go forward as soon as possible. All the problems, including Kashmir, which is a very serious problem, and water and other problems -- we want to talk about all that -- including terrorism," he said.
News of the offer came a day after India announced that its interior minister, P Chidambaram, would travel to Pakistan this month for a regional meeting.
He will be the first cabinet member to cross the border since the Mumbai assault.
While the international community has generally lauded Indian restraint in the wake of the Mumbai attacks, pressure has grown for New Delhi to re-engage with Islamabad given the fraught situation in Afghanistan.
The United States, battling the Taliban in Afghanistan, is keen for the two rivals to keep the rest of the region trouble-free.
Pakistani officials have pushed Washington to persuade India to resume a dialogue, claiming the perceived threat from their powerful neighbour limits Pakistan's capacity to fight Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
Islamabad's fears are fuelled by massive Indian investment in Afghanistan, where Pakistan has historically sought influence to offset Indian might.
Uday Bhaskar, head of the National Maritime Foundation, a New Delhi-based strategic affairs think-tank, said India always knew that a resumption of dialogue was inevitable.
"The fact is that India must engage with Pakistan. Both geography and the nature of Indo-Pak relations don't allow us the luxury to remain unengaged," Bhaskar said.
Relations have always been fraught and have triggered three wars since 1947 - two of them over Kashmir.
India is no stranger to militant violence, but the scale and focus of the Mumbai attacks, which targeted landmark five-star hotels in the financial capital, stunned the country.
Top leaders from both countries have since met several times during regional conferences, but until now there has been little progress towards normalisation.
Kalim Bahadur, a retired professor of Indo-Pakistan studies from Jawaharlal Nehru University, said India's offer of talks would be welcomed by the international community, but would be greeted with some confusion at home.
"The Indian government seemed insistent that positive action would have to be made by Pakistan before dialogue can restart," Bahadur said.
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