Pakistan-India Joint Working Group on Cross-LoC CBMs discusses modalities for strengthening and streamlining the existing trade and travel arrangements across the Line of Control; President Obama announces new US envoys to Afghanistan and Pakistan; Pakist
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  • According to reports, the meeting of Pakistan-India Joint Working Group on Cross-LoC CBMs (Confidence Building Measures) on July 19, 2012 discussed modalities for strengthening and streamlining the existing trade and travel arrangements across the Line of Control. Pakistan delegation was headed by Zehra Akbari, Director General (South Asia) Ministry of Foreign Affairs, while the Indian side was led by Y.K. Sinha, Joint Secretary (PAI) Ministry of External Affairs, at the Foreign Office here. The meeting reviewed the progress of the last meeting of Joint Working Group on Cross-LoC CBMs. The meeting was held in a cordial and constructive atmosphere, a Foreign Office statement said. “They also discussed modalities for introducing additional Cross-LoC CBMs,” it said. 1

    In another development, according to reports, President Barack Obama on July 17, 2012, named veteran diplomats to be the US ambassadors to Afghanistan and Pakistan, tasking them with shaping highly sensitive relationships after US troops pull out. Two month after the incumbents resigned, Obama named Richard Olson, a former ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, to serve in Pakistan and James Cunningham, the number two at the US embassy in Kabul, to be the ambassador. 2

    Reports noted that Pakistan and Iran on July 18, 2012, agreed to form a Joint Working Group (JWG) to expedite the Iran-Pakistan Gas Pipeline Project. A meeting of the Pakistan-Iran Joint Committee on oil, gas and energy was held on July 17-18, 2012 at Islamabad to discuss bilateral cooperation in said sectors. The Iranian team was headed by Dr Ahmad Khalidi, Deputy Minister for Internal Affairs to Minister for Petroleum and Pakistani team was headed by Abid Saeed, Additional Secretary, Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Resources. The two sides discussed issues of mutual interest particularly the energy sector. The Iranian side expressed its intention to invest in the E & P sector including investment in the upstream and midstream. The Iranian side also invited Pakistani companies to invest in E & P sector in Iran. 3

    In other developments, Pakistan’s head of intelligence will next week visit the United States to resume talks on drone strikes. It is the first time in a year the head of the ISI intelligence agency will travel to Washington, signaling a thaw in relations beset by crisis since US troops found and killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan in May 2011. Lieutenant General Zaheer ul-Islam, who was appointed in March, will hold talks with CIA director David Petraeus on US drone strikes, counter-terror cooperation and intelligence sharing.4

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