Officials said no military hardware was damaged in the fighting.
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“I see some gaps (in intelligence) but we will be able to understand only after the investigation”.
A source privy to the details said that the meeting discussed the Pathankot attack and the information shared so far by India.
The meeting came as India said it is waiting for “prompt and decisive action” as promised by Sharif to Prime Minister Narendra Modi during a telephone call on Tuesday.
In an article in the Daily Beast, Riedel said the attacks in Pathankot and on the Indian Consulate in Mazar-e Sharif in northern Afghanistan was the handiwork of Pakistani terror group Jaish-e-Muhammad (JeM) which the ISI created 15 years ago.
“Their words are encouraging”, said a senior Indian official who requested anonymity due to the sensitivity of the issue.
The Congress screened a short film containing Modi’s anti-Pakistan statements when he was Gujarat chief minister, and claimed little action had been taken despite the spurt in terror incidents since he became Prime Minister.
According to earlier reports, India wanted the the NSAs of the two countries to meet before Foreign Secretary-level talks are held.
“If talks remain on track, it is because both sides have demonstrated unusual restraint”, Ajai Shukla, a retired army colonel, wrote in the Business Standard newspaper. Despite India’s limited leverage, India can and must find ways to “act” against the Pakistan jihad factory.
Sincerity of goal must be a two-way path. It is time for India to call a spade a spade.
“The way the militants crossed such a sensitive border without much effort clearly shows there are problems in India’s border management”, said Sameer Patil, a security analyst with Gateway House, a think tank in Mumbai. “Who is responsible for not using the army stationed already in Pathankot and sending the NSG instead?” he asked. As I said, it will depend on many things. The area is so complicated and had a hard terrain and blocking roads is not army’s responsibility. The countries have fought four wars since 1947 and maintain one of the world’s most heavily militarized borders.
Now for Modi and Sharif to pick up the pieces once again of a peace process that repeatedly encounters the same hurdle at the starting line and leaves us with the same imponderable: we continue official dialogue, the ISI’s terror factory believe they have a free run; we stop, we would be doing exactly what they want us to do. Alliance spokesman Syed Sadaqat Hussain issued a statement to Current News Service, based in the Indian portion of Kashmir, saying the attack carried a message for India that no security establishment was out of the militants’ reach.
Modi’s Lahore visit came after a series of diplomatic engagements between New Delhi and Islamabad.
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Responding to a poser on whether India is consistent with its policy that terror and talks can’t go together, Swarup said New Delhi has repeatedly emphasized that there must be talks on terror.
