Indo-Pak MPs urge liberal visa regime

A 19-member Pakistani parliamentary delegation interacted with their Indian counterparts and reviewed the relations between the two neighbours, stressing on the need for a liberal visa regime.
According to a message received from New Delhi on Friday, the Round-II of India-Pakistan Parliamentary Dialogue began in Vigyan Bhawan Annexe, New Delhi on Thursday.
Former federal law minister Senator SM Zafar and former Indian union minister for external affairs and finance Yashwant Sinha, co-chaired the first day of the dialogue.
The Pakistani delegation, which left for India on August 17, is jointly led by Senate Deputy Chairman Senate Jan Mohammad Khan Jamali, and NA Deputy Speaker Faisal Karim Kundi.
The two sides discussed ways and means of moving forward on various issues, including strengthening people-to-people contacts.
Other issues that were taken up during the first day of talks included terrorism, Jammu and Kashmir, water, role of the media, removal of the trust deficit and developing a future mechanism to carry forward the parliamentary dialogue process. The discussion will help parliamentarians evolve a follow-up action plan, which will then be forwarded to their respective governments in the two countries as policy inputs for improving relations between the two countries. The Pakistan-India Parliamentarians’ Dialogue-I, was facilitated by Pakistan Institute for Legislative Development And Transparency (PILDAT) in Islamabad on January 6-7, 2011.
A seven-member Indian parliamentary delegation engaged with multi-party group of Pakistani MPs on topics that included strengthening people-to-people contacts, a liberal visa regime; terrorism; Jammu and Kashmir; water; role of media; removing the trust deficit and other issues like the role of women, trade, role of military and intelligence agencies and continuation of dialogue and exchange programmes.