"The ministerial meeting is part of the SAARC calendar and the External Affairs Minister is expected to attend it," External Affairs Ministry spokesman said in response to a question on the SAARC meet. SAARC Foreign Ministers are slated to attend the two-day meeting in Islamabad from July 20.
Besides India, the group's members are Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Bhutan, Nepal and the Maldives. Singh may utilise the occasion to also have bilateral talks with Pakistani leadership as also his counterparts from other member States.
In Islamabad, Foreign Ministry spokesman Masood Khan said Singh will meet Pakistani leaders, but the "agenda has not been finalised." Expert-level talks Nuclear Confidence Building Measures is slated to take place in New Delhi for two days from June 19 during which the two sides are expected to discuss how to reduce the risks of a nuclear conflict.
This will be followed by talks between the two Foreign Secretaries on June 27 and 28 on peace and security including CBMs and Jammu and Kashmir.
As a sequel to this, the two Foreign Ministers are expected to hold direct talks sometime in August, the venue for which is still to be worked out. Khan said Singh and his Pakistani counterpart, Khursheed Kasuri, are also likely to meet June 21-22 in Beijing during the Asian Cooperation Dialogue meeting.
