Thaindian News

Islamabad, March 27 (IANS) Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani will travel to Mohali to watch the India-Pakistan World Cup semifinal March 30, it was announced Sunday, following an invitation from Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, who unleashed cricket diplomacy to ease persistent tensions between the two countries.

But President Asif Ali Zardari, who too was invited by the Indian prime minister to watch what is seen as the most explosive match of the World Cup, would not be going to India, presidential spokesman Farhatullah Babar said.

Zardari, however, added to the warming sub-continental ties by remitting the remaining jail term of an Indian languishing in a jail for the past 27 years.

Babar said the decision on Gilani travelling to India was taken at a meeting that lasted for about two hours between the president and the prime minister in Islamabad late Saturday.

“It was decided in response to the Indian prime minister’s invitation that Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani will visit India to witness the semifinal cricket match,” Babar was quoted as saying in a statement.

Gilani will “informally” meet Manmohan Singh during the match and a formal meeting will be held after the match at which bilateral matters will be discussed, Geo News reported citing official sources.

The sources said the two leaders will also hold discussions on “cricket diplomacy” to improve bilateral relations.

Babar said the remission to the Indian convict, Gopal Das, was granted on the Gilani’s advice to honour an appeal by the Indian Supreme Court to the Pakistani government.

Gopal Das had been arrested by Pakistani Rangers when he strayed onto their territory in 1984.

The Indian Supreme Court had recently appealed to the Pakistani government to consider granting remission to Gopal Dass on humanitarian grounds and to free him.

A day earlier, India had announced an unilateral move to increase the stay period for people visiting Jammu and Kashmir from Pakistan-administered Kashmir to six months with multiple entries.

Officials of Pakistan’s sports ministry and the Pakistan Cricket Board will also attend the Mohali match, and thousands of Pakistani cricket fans are expected to watch the match. India plans to issue 5,000 visas.

The match will come a day after home secretary-level talks between the two countries March 28-29.

Pakistan’s Interior Secretary Chaudhry Qamar Zaman arrived in India Sunday for the meeting with his Indian counterpart G.K. Pillai, saying he is bringing the “message of friendship and friendliness” from his country.

“My priority will be to take this message of friendship and friendliness from Pakistan to my colleagues in India, with whom I will get the opportunity after a break of couple of years,” Zaman said after crossing into India at the land border in Punjab.

Manmohan Singh’s invitation is a repeat of similar cricket diplomacy on two earlier occasions.

In 1987, Gen. Zia ul-Haq visited Jaipur at Rajiv Gandhi’s invitation. Almost two decades later, in 2005, then president Pervez Musharraf flew to New Delhi on Manmohan Singh’s invitation.

Both visits helped ease tensions in India-Pakistan relations.

Now, the relations are strained by New Delhi’s demand that Islamabad punish the masterminds of the 2008 Mumbai terror attack and the dispute over Jammu and Kashmir, where India accuses Pakistan of backing separatist guerrillas.

Meanwhile, a petition has been filed in a Karachi court seeking to shift the semifinal out of India to a third country over fears for the safety of the Pakistani team if it defeats India.

Advocate Abid Hassan told the Sindh High Court in Karachi that Shiv Sena leader Bal Thackeray had threatened to attack the Pakistani players if they win, Geo News reported.

A Shiv Sena spokesman in Mumbai denied that Thackeray had issued such a threat.