Islamabad: Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi has claimed that India agreed to resume bilateral dialogue because Pakistan did not give in to pressure.
Qureshi boasted of forcing India to come to the talking table while addressing a public gathering in Multan on Sunday.
"India, which had talked of severing all contacts with us, has now come to us. We never kneeled down before them and kept sticking to our stance," claimed Qureshi.
Qureshi had just a week back complained about India's reluctance to talk and had even threatened to go the United Nation to force India.
"Pakistan will approach the international forum if India does not agree to talk," Qureshi had said while speaking in London.
India and Pakistan have agreed to take steps to restore ties that had been severed following the 26/11 terror attacks.
The foreign secretaries of the two countries are expected to meet later this month as a part of a new confidence building exercise.
A broad agreement has been reached that the two foreign secretaries will focus on rebuilding confidence post 26/11.
On the agenda will be ways to enhance co-operation in counter-terrorism, enhancing cross LoC and bilateral trade, enhancing travel linkages like new buses and train services, boosting tourism flows to each other's countries, ensuring sanctity of the ceasefire, humanitarian issues such as those on prisoner treatment and facilitating release of fishermen.
Both sides have agreed to junk the old composite dialogue format and talks, to start with, will focus on humanitarian issues and confidence building measures, leaving tricky issues like the Kashmir dispute to much later.
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