Foreign Secretary Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will begin his “SAARC yatra” with a visit to Thimphu on March 1st and Dhaka on March 2nd, followed by a visit to Islamabad, where he will resume India-Pakistan foreign secretary-level talks that were cancelled last year, the Ministry of External Affairs announced today.
The decision to send Mr. Jaishankar was announced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi when he spoke to other SAARC leaders ahead of the World Cup in early February. At the time he had informed Pakistan Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif that he would be sending the new foreign secretary to Pakistan. In his statement, MEA Spokesperson Syed Akbaruddin said, "Foreign Secretary will, in accordance with the Prime Minister’s directives, be undertaking the first phase of the SAARC Yatra."
Later in the month, he would visit Nepal, and also Sri Lanka and the Maldives, and the dates for those “are being worked out” the MEA said.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi is planning to visit Colombo on March 13th followed by Male, barring any changes due to the current political crisis in the Maldives, and the Foreign Secretary’s visit could be coordinated accordingly. The SAARC yatra is Prime Minister Modi’s next big outreach in the neighbourhood, after he had invited all SAARC leaders to his swearing in ceremony in May 2014, and his initiatives announced at the SAARC summit in Kathmandu in November 2014.
S. Jaishankar's March, 2015 itinerary:
1st | Bhutan 2nd | Bangladesh 3rd | Pakistan 4th | AfghanistanThis article has been updated to correct a factual error.
