India’s foreign minister met with Pakistani President Pervez Musharraf today amid hopes the two sides could iron out an agreement to start a historic bus service between the capitals of divided Kashmir, the Himalayan province at the heart of decades of disagreement.

Pakistan offered relief and rescue assistance to India in the wake of the tidal waves that killed thousands of people on its southern coast, as the nuclear-armed rivals began two-day peace talks today.

The foreign secretaries of nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan began two-day talks today that will include their first formal dialogue on disputed Kashmir since they launched a peace process a year ago, officials said.

Pakistani and Indian officials launched talks today on how to avoid an accidental nuclear war.

Pakistani and Indian officials will try to agree to more safeguards to avert war when they meet for two-day talks, a foreign ministry spokesman said.

Pakistan’s president plans to stop in Washington next week on his way home from Latin America to congratulate President George Bush on his re-election.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh headed to India’s portion of disputed Kashmir today for the start of a partial troop withdrawal hailed by rival Pakistan as an important step toward easing tensions over the Himalayan region.

The foreign ministers of India and Pakistan prepared to resume talks today after harsh words over the weekend threatened to complicate the wide-ranging discussions that include their decades-old dispute over Kashmir.

India and Pakistan opened high-level talks today aimed at solving their decades-old dispute over Kashmir with Pakistan denying it arms and trains a separatist insurgency in the region and accusing India of human rights abuses there.

Pakistani President General Pervez Musharraf and the nation’s prime minister today condemned the murder of two Pakistanis kidnapped in Iraq.

Kidnappers released a senior Egyptian diplomat they had seized outside a mosque as two other militant groups threatened to kill four new foreign hostages amid an increasingly audacious wave of kidnappings in Iraq.

AMERICAN and Iraqi forces clashed with insurgents north of Baghdad early yesterday, killing 13 Iraqi militants, the US military said.

A terrorist threat forced the British High Commission in Pakistan to close and the US Embassy to postpone a reception marking American Independence Day, officials said.

Manmohan Singh, the soft-spoken economist named India’s next prime minister, pledged today to work to restore religious harmony, keep India investor-friendly and seek peace with rival Pakistan.

Pakistan tribal leaders, ordered to flush out suspected al-Qaida fugitives along the Afghan border, may be given more time to allow a 2,000-strong posse to finish the task, officials said today.

Pakistan tested its longest-range missile yet today, capable of carrying a nuclear warhead and hitting targets deep inside neighbouring India, a defence ministry official said.

NUCLEAR rivals India and Pakistan yesterday reached agreement on the timetable for sustained peace talks on disputed Kashmir and other tough issues separating the South Asian neighbours.

Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan took peace talks into a second day today, working on a timetable for a sustained dialogue to resolve the decades-old Kashmir dispute and other major issues.

Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan began historic meetings today aimed at preparing the way for a sustained peace dialogue on Kashmir and other disputes that have kept the neighbours at loggerheads for decades.

Nuclear-armed rivals India and Pakistan began historic meetings today aimed at preparing the way for a sustained peace dialogue on Kashmir and other disputes that have kept them at loggerheads for decades.

Senior officials of Pakistan and India will start peace talks in Islamabad on February 16-18, Pakistan’s foreign ministry spokesman said.

Building on momentum toward better relations after a half-century of venom, the leaders of nuclear rivals Pakistan and India held much-anticipated face-to-face talks today.

PAKISTAN yesterday admitted scientists involved in its atom bomb program may have been driven by “personal ambition or greed” to export technology to Iran, but added that the government had no part in any such deals.

At least 44 people were killed today and 150 wounded when car bombs exploded at a crowded jewellery market and a historic landmark in Bombay.