New Delhi: Postponement of Sino-India border talks between Special Representatives notwithstanding, India on Tuesday said its high-level defence dialogue with China would take place next month as planned earlier.
"I think, we expect whatever is in the pipeline will continue," External Affairs Minister S M Krishna told reporters on the sidelines of Passport Officers' Conference here.
He was responding to a question on whether the defence dialogue between India and China, scheduled to be held here on December 8 and 9, would take place and if it help resume military exchanges between the two countries. Defence secretaries of India and China would meet in New Delhi on those two days and discuss issues of mutual interest.
The comments of Krishna, who met India's Ambassador to China S Jaishankar this morning, assume significance in the wake of the talks between Special Representatives of India and China scheduled to have taken place on Monday and Tuesday being postponed. The talks were postponed after China objected to the presence of the Tibetan spiritual leader, the Dalai Lama at a Buddhist conference here.
"Our Ambassador to China was here for regular consultations with the Foreign Office. He had also come prepared to assist the government if the talks between Special Representatives of India and China discussing the border issues were to be held. I think, now the meeting is postponed," he said.
"He (the Ambassador) served the useful purpose of exchanging views with the Foreign Office," he said.
On comments by former Pakistan Foreign Minister SM Qureshi that the country's nuclear weapons were not safe under Asif Ali Zardari regime, Krishna termed it as an "internal affair" of another country and that it was for them to settle it.
Asked whether the nukes in Pakistan were safe, Krishna said: "Well, we go by the Government of Pakistan. We go along with the assurances given by the government there."
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