Sushma Swaraj dubs meeting with Sartaj Aziz 'a courtesy call'

 External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj on Tuesday said that her meeting with Pakistan National Security Adviser Sartaj Aziz on the sidelines of the ongoing SAARC Summit in Kathmandu was a courtesy interaction. "This is a common courtesy that if people from different countries meet in an international meeting, they greet each other, and that's how we met," Swaraj told mediapersons after the meeting.

The External Affairs Minister, however, once again refused to clarify if there would be a meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif. "I had said yesterday, please wait, I don't know anything yet," she said. The brief interaction between Swaraj and Aziz took place as speculations are still going on about a possible meeting between Prime Minister Modi and Sharif.

Prime Minister Modi is scheduled to leave for Kathmandu this afternoon to attend the 18th SAARC Summit, accompanied by National Security Advisor Ajit Doval and Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh, besides Sushma Swaraj. The two-day long Summit will see all the heads of the government making their policy statements. Agreements on transport, energy and electricity sector are also expected to be signed. Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, the Maldives, Nepal, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka comprise the bloc, which was founded by seven states in 1985.