PM Modi to be invited to attend SAARC Summit, says Pakistan Foreign Office

Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be invited to attend the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Summit, Dawn News quoted Pakistan Foreign Office spokesman Mohammad Faisal as saying on Tuesday. Faisal said Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan in his first address had said that if India took one step forward, Pakistan would take two. He added that Khan, in his response to Modi's letter, had expressed Pakistan's openness to resolving all outstanding issues through dialogue with India.

SAARC Summits are usually held biennially hosted by a member state in alphabetical order. The member state hosting the summit assumes the Chair of the Association. The last SAARC Summit in 2014 was held in Kathmandu, which was attended by Modi.  The 2016 SAARC Summit was to be held in Islamabad. But after the terrorist attack on an Indian Army camp in Uri in Jammu and Kashmir on September 18 that year, India expressed its inability to participate in the summit due to "prevailing circumstances" and stepped up diplomatic pressure on Pakistan.

Nineteen Indian soldiers died in the attack. The summit was called off after Bangladesh, Bhutan and Afghanistan also declined to participate in the Islamabad meet Maldives and Sri Lanka are the seventh and eighth members of the initiative. 

"We fought a war with India, relations cannot be fixed quickly," Faisal said. "In this century diplomacy has completely changed," he said, adding policies are now made based on citizens' emotions and wishes.

Where is Kartarpur Sahib? 

# Kartarpur Sahib in Pakistan is located across the river Ravi, about four kilometres from the Dera Baba Nanak shrine in Punjab's Gurdaspur district. It was established by the Sikh Guru in 1522.

# The first Gurdwara, Gurdwara Kartarpur Sahib, was built here, where Guru Nanak Dev is said to have died.

# Both India and Pakistan have decided to build a corridor, linking Dera Baba Nanak in Punjab's Gurdaspur district with the Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur, Pakistan. 

(With PTI inputs)