Pakistan team leaves for India for Baghliar Dam talks
Pakistan Times Staff Report

ISLAMABAD: An eight-member Pakistani delegation left for New Delhi to hold talks on the contentious Baghliar Dam.

Federal Secretary of Water and Power Dr. Ashfaq Mehmood leading the delegation comprised of the Indus Water Commissioner Syed Jamaat Ali Shah and other experts.

Pakistani water officials will hold talks with Indian officials from January-4 to 6 to seek solution of the dispute in the light of Pakistan’s objections over construction of Baghliar Dam.

Pakistan has declared that it will go to the World Bank if the issue was not settled in the meeting.

Pakistan for negotiated Settlement

Meanwhile, Foreign Office Spokesman Masood Khan has said that Pakistan's priority is to resolve the Baglihar dam issue with India mutually as the treaty is generally working between the two countries.

"Our demand is that India should suspend construction work when there are differences between the two countries", the spokesman told VOA.

He said Pakistan has technical level reservations regarding height, design, turbine and spill way of the dam, adding the current specification violates many sections of the Indus Water Treaty.

Masood said that Pakistan is trying since 1989 to achieve mutual understanding but the Indian bureaucracy has been using delaying tactics.

"We have raised this issue before permanent Indus Commission. Later, Commissioners of the two countries have met and we have raised it at Water and Power Secretaries level but no success was achieved," he said.

It was decided last year that the issue should be moved in the World Bank but the Indian External Affairs Minister Natwar Singh has assured that the issue can be resolved through bilateral talks, he said.

The Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also assured Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz in November during his visit to India that efforts can be made regarding bilateral negotiations, he added.

"We want to make a last effort, if it failed then our leadership has decided to consult the World Bank", he said.

To a question he said the inclusion of third party in the issue on Pakistan's request would not affect the process of composite dialogue between the two countries.●