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Pakistan to respond 'positively to all Indian moves'

REUTERS, Islamabad
Pakistan promised yesterday to respond positively to every Indian peace gesture and said it hoped talks would start soon to resolve all the outstanding issues, including Kashmir.
Foreign Ministry spokesman Aziz Ahmed Khan told a regular weekly news briefing Islamabad would soon announce measures to improve relations.
"We want to enter into a dialogue process, a negotiating process, with a positive frame of
mind," Khan said.
India has sent a "positive" reply to Jamali's invitation to talks with his Indian counterpart, Khan said, further spurring hopes of a thaw between the two neighbours.
"We have received a response and it is a positive response."
Pakistan Prime Minister Zafarullah Khan Jamali sent a written invitation to Atal Behari Vajpayee on Friday, formalising his telephoned offer on April 28 for talks in Pakistan.
The current easing in tensions
was triggered by Vajpayee's April 18 offer to sit down to talks called for repeatedly by Pakistan.
It comes ahead of visits to both countries this week by US Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage and Assistant Secretary of State for South Asia Christina Rocca.
They are due in Islamabad late Wednesday for talks the following day with President Pervez Musharraf and Jamali, US and Pakistani officials said.
Armitage, the US administration's chief troubleshooter, is
credited with pulling the nuclear neighbours back from the brink of conflict almost 12 months ago.
Khan said relations with India would be on the agenda.
"Of course during that visit the situation vis-a-vis India and all other issues will also be discussed," Khan told a press conference.
Jamali was due to meet the opposition and parties in the ruling coalition to discuss "a joint strategy" on approaching the first talks with
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its rival since a 17-month old impasse took hold.
"All major parties, the allies of the government and the opposition parties have been invited," a spokesman for Jamali told AFP.
The two sides have been locked in a standoff since December 2001 when India blamed Pakistan for a deadly attack on its parliament. Pakistan denied any link to the attack, in which nine people plus the five gunmen were killed.
Diplomatic, air, trade, cultural and sporting ties were severed, and for 10 months one million troops from both sides were deployed along their border.
Vajpayee on Friday announced India would send an ambassador back to Islamabad and restore civil aviation links. Pakistani officials have pledged to reciprocate the move, although a formal announcement has yet to be made.
Khan said the Indian moves were not groundbreaking.
"These are all welcome measures, but these are measures that bring us to a situation where we were almost a year and a half ago," he said.
However he added: "For every gesture there will be a positive response from our side."