India and Pakistan held secret talks on Kashmir
RAW and ISI officials met to reopen a back channel for diplomacy
I think there have been meetings between the highest level people.”
Top intelligence officers from India and Pakistan held secret talks in a Gulf country in January in a new effort to calm military tension over the Himalayan region of Kashmir, people with close knowledge of the matter said in Delhi.
Ties between the nucleararmed rivals have been on ice since a suicide bombing of an Indian military convoy in Kashmir in 2019 traced to Pakistan-based militants that led to India sending warplanes to Pakistan.
Later that year, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi withdrew Indian-ruled Kashmir’s autonomy in order to tighten his grip over the territory, provoking outrage in Pakistan and the downgrading of diplomatic ties and suspension of bilateral trade. But the two governments have re-opened a back channel of diplomacy aimed at a modest roadmap to normalising ties over the next several months, the people said.
Officials from India’s Research and Analysis Wing, the external spy agency, and Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence travelled to the Gulf country for a meeting facilitated by that country’s government, two people said.
Ayesha Siddiqa | Top Pakistani defence analyst
No official comments
The Indian foreign ministry did not respond to a request for comment. Pakistan’s military, which controls the ISI, also did not respond.
But Ayesha Siddiqa, a top Pakistani defence analyst, said she believed Indian and Pakistan intelligence officials had been meeting for several months in third countries. “I think there have been meetings between the highest level people,” she said.
Such meetings have taken place in the past too, especially during times of crises but never been publicly acknowledged.
“There is a lot that can still go wrong, it is fraught,” said one of the people in Delhi. “That is why nobody is talking it up in public, we don’t even have a name for this, it’s not a peace process. You can call it a re-engagement,” one of them said.