Five years after they agreed to put together a series of nuclear confidence-building measures at Lahore in 1999, senior officials from India and Pakistan will finally embark tomorrow on their first round of talks on the issue. The two-day dialogue over the weekend in the city is aimed at mutually exploring each other’s nuclear doctrines, at the end of which a joint statement is likely to be issued. The Pakistani team, led by additional secretary Tariq Usman Haider in the Pakistan foreign office, arrived here this morning. ‘‘We are coming with a positive spirit and positive suggestions. We are here for result-oriented talks,’’ Haider said, adding that the ‘‘delegations of both India and Pakistan have a responsibility to the people of the two countries.’’ A circumspect Foreign Office remained tight-lipped about the content of the discussions, although it is expected that a few CBMs mentioned in the Lahore MoU — advance notification of ballistic missiles, steps to reduce risks of accidental or unauthorised use of nuclear weapons, notify each other about accidental, unauthorised or unexplained incidents to prevent outbreak of hostilities and work out a mechanism in this regard — could be formally notified. Under the Lahore MoU, the two countries agreed to abide by their unilateral moratorium on conducting further nuclear tests, ‘‘unless either side, in exercise of its national sovereignty decides extraordinary events have jeopardised its supreme interests.’’ The Pakistani team will call on External Affairs minister K Natwar Singh, NSA J.N. Dixit as well as Foreign Secretary Shashank tomorrow. As the two sides size each other up over the next two days, they will also address the concerns in the international community that have emerged from time to time over the ‘‘nuclearised’’ sub-continent. To be sure, both India and Pakistan reject the West’s favourite ‘‘nuclear flashpoint’’ theory, what with the considerable communication between the two sides, especially in times of peace. There was no word over whether the Indian side would raise its concerns about the rampant nuclear proliferation in Pakistan, courtesy A.Q. Khan. Certainly, there has been enormous concern within the Indian strategic community on this score, but for the moment at least New Delhi is unlikely to embarrass its guests with such a mention. Natwar Singh’s recently aired proposal of exploring a common nuclear doctrine between India, Pakistan and China will also hardly find favour during this dialogue. For a start, Islamabad had diplomatically trashed the proposal earlier — that was before India and Pakistan agreed to stop their mutually acrimonious rhetoric — and in this newly pacific mood nobody wants to raise any more debate. Observers said New Delhi, transparent and overboard about its own no-first-use policy which it announced soon after its nuclear tests, wanted to explore and understand in a friendly manner Pakistan’s own views of its own doctrine. At international fora, Pakistani officials have never really abandoned a first-use posture, but various statements at different periods have said that Pakistan will only use its nuclear weapons if it is faced with annihilation. Pakistan’s Haider, will be assisted by Jalil Abbas Jilani, deputy high commissioner in New Delhi until he was expelled last year and at present director general of the South Asia desk in the Pakistan foreign office, Masood Khan, spokesman with additional responsibility on the UN desk, and Group Captain Khalid Banuri in Strategic Plans Division. The Indian side will be headed by Sheel Kant Sharma, additional secretary in the MEA.
