Washington, June 4 (IANS) Though India is not quite satisfied with the way Pakistan has tackled those responsible for the November 2008 Mumbai terror attack, it Friday expressed willingness to keep talking to Islamabad to reduce the trust deficit between the two countries.
‘Keeping talking to each other and engaging each other was an age old practice to overcome trust deficit between two countries,’ External Affairs Minister S. M. Krishna told reporters here Friday.
‘We are just giving it a try and we are hopeful that Pakistan would not be wanting in India’s efforts to reach out,’ he said, noting that Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had time and again expressed his willingness to go more than half the way if Pakistan tackled those responsible for the Mumbai attack.
‘Well, things are not exactly going as per our estimates, but nonetheless, we can’t give up,’ he said. ‘We will have to keep engaging Pakistan, we will have to keep talking to them and that is what we intend doing.’
‘I am looking forward to going to Islamabad. My approach would be to start with ‘It’s a trust deficit between our two countries’. This visit of mine would be to address that trust deficit,’ said Krishna, who would be travelling to Islamabad July 15.
The decision on the talks was that of India and Pakistan alone, he said. ‘Yes, there are friendly countries who like a very cordial relationship to be established between India and Pakistan and that’s respected,’ Krishna said when asked if he had received a tip from the US on how to reduce the trust deficit with Pakistan.
(Arun Kumar can be contacted at arun.kumar@ians.in)
