New Delhi: In their first meeting after the Kargil war, the Indian DGMO will on Tuesday cross over to the Pakistani side of the Wagah border to meet his counterpart to discuss ways of ensuring ceasefire on the LoC and is expected to register his protest over the cross-border raids.
The meeting of the Director Generals of Military Operations (DGMOs) was proposed by Pakistan last week and India accepted it, three months after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his counterpart Nawaz Sharif proposed this meeting to defuse tension.
At the meeting, the Indian side will be represented by DGMO Lt Gen Vinod Bhatia while Pakistan will be represented by his counterpart Maj Gen Amir Riaz.
During the meeting, the Indian side is expected to take up for discussion the cross-border raids by Pakistani troops in this year in which over 7 Indian troops have been killed.
High tension prevailed during the two incidents in January and August this year and the Indian Army Chief Gen Bikram Singh had later stated that the Indian side reserved the right to retaliate at the time and place of its choosing.
To defuse the tension on the LoC and other places along their boundary, the two DGMOs talk to each other on Tuesdays over a hotline. The two sides signed an agreement in 2003 to maintain ceasefire along the LoC and the Actual Ground Position Line (AGPL) in Siachen.
On September 29, Singh and Sharif agreed on a meeting between the DGMOs during their talks on the margins of the UN General Assembly meet in New York.
The premiers felt a meeting between the top Army officers would help reduce tension on the LoC that were at a peak following the killing of five Indian soldiers in an attack in August amid a series of ceasefire violations by Pakistan.
However, the meeting was not scheduled and both sides did not give reasons for the delay.
