India, Pakistan held talks

New Delhi: Top intelligence officers from India and Pakistan held secret talks in Dubai in January in a new effort to calm military tension over the disputed Himalayan region of Kashmir, people with close knowledge of the matter have told Reuters.

Ties between the nucleararmed rivals have been on ice since a suicide bombing of an Indian military convoy in Kashmir in 2019, traced to Pakistanbased militants, that led to India sending warplanes to Pakistan.

But the two governments have reopened a back channel of diplomacy aimed at normalising ties over the next several months, informants said.

Officials from India’s Research and Analysis Wing, the external spy agency, and Pakistan’s InterServices Intelligence travelled to Dubai for a meeting facilitated by the United Arab Emirates government, two people said.

Ayesha Siddiqa, a top Pakistani defence analyst, said she believed Indian and Pakistan intelligence officials had been meeting for several months in other countries.