Krishna, Qureshi talk over phone today

New Delhi/Islamabad: Indian External Affairs Minister S M Krishna, before leaving for a three-day visit to Kazakhstan on Tuesday, will talk to Pakistan Foreign Ministers Shah Mehmood Qureshi over telephone to set dates for their meeting.

Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi said in Islamabad he was "looking forward to having a telephone conversation with my Indian counterpart Krishna tomorrow" to decide the modalities for future talks between the two sides.

He also said Pakistan wants to sustain the "momentum generated" during the meeting between Pakistan's Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and his Indian counterpart Manmohan Singh on the sidelines of the SAARC summit at Thimphu, Bhutan on April 29.

"While the two countries had agreed to come back to the negotiating table to discuss all the issues, in order for the peace process to achieve concrete results, it was important that the dialogue between the two countries continued uninterruptedly," Qureshi said, according to a statement issued by Pakistan's Foreign Office.

"The India-Pakistan peace process can achieve concrete results only if the dialogue between the two countries continues without interruption," Qureshi said while speaking at a meeting with a group of former foreign ministers, foreign secretaries and ambassadors.

Qureshi stressed that the two prime ministers had agreed to take cognisance of "each other's concerns and resume the peace process in the spirit of resolving all the issues on the basis of sovereign equality and mutual respect."

India's Foreign Secretary Nirupama Rao said that all issues will be discussed when the foreign ministers and foreign secretaries of the two countries will meet in the days ahead.

"Both prime ministers have asked their foreign ministers and foreign secretaries to meet as soon as possible," India's external affairs ministry spokesperson Vishnu Prakash told reporters in New Delhi on Monday.

Prakash added that the two sides are trying to find "a mutually convenient time slot to have telephonic conversation" between their foreign ministers."

"In all probability, it will happen on Tuesday," a highly-placed Indian source told IANS.

The two ministers were supposed to talk Friday. Krishna had told the Rajya Sabha Thursday that he will be talking to "my counterpart in Pakistan tomorrow (Friday)".

However, the call could not take place as Qureshi was busy with other engagements.

During their telephonic conversation, Krishna is expected to invite Qureshi to India for talks, sources said. "Dates are being looked at. It could happen towards the end of the month."

Manmohan Singh and Gilani, after talks in Thimphu on April 29, directed their foreign ministers and foreign secretaries to meet and work out modalities of restoring trust between the two countries.

India suspended the composite dialogue with Pakistan after the 26/11 Mumbai carnage in which many Pakistani nationals were involved.