Natwar Singh to visit Kabul, Islamabad

India's commitment to assist in rebuilding of Afghanistan and carrying forward the composite dialogue with Pakistan, involving enhanced people-to-people contacts, is expected to be reinforced during External Affairs Minister K Natwar Singh's three-day visit to the two countries from February 15.

Singh will make a brief visit to Kabul on February 15 before flying the same day to Islamabad for talks with Pakistani leaders. New Delhi is attaching special significance to his trip to Kabul, the first high-level one by an Indian leader after the recent Afghan elections.

Under the NDA regime, Jaswant Singh had visited Kabul as the external affairs minister in December, 2002, for the installation of the interim government headed by Hamid Karzai. Yashwant Sinha too made a trip to that country after taking over from Jaswant Singh.

Natwar Singh will hold wide-ranging discussions with President Karzai and other leaders covering the entire gamut of bilateral relations besides exchanging views on important developments in the region as also multilateral issues.

The minister has also convened a meeting of India's consuls-general in four Afghan cities to assess the post-election scenario.

Terming the Afghan elections as a "major event", he said it was quite remarkable that women voted in large numbers. Singh will hold extensive parleys with his Afghan counterpart Abdullah Abdullah.

One of the issues that is expected to come up is that of transit rights for Indian goods to Afghanistan via Pakistan.

The two sides will review the progress in the Zeranj-Delaram road link. Singh is likely to seek Kabul's views on reports of re-emergence of Taliban and Al Qaeda activists in some areas.

During his Islamabad trip, Singh may also use the occasion to put across reasons behind India's decision not to attend the Dhaka meet. New Delhi has held that the developments in Nepal in the wake of King Gyanendra's decision to sack the Sher Bahadur Dueba government and the deteriorating security situation in Bangladesh had prompted it to take this decision.