Srinagar: The three Kashmiri separatists who were placed under house arrest just hours ago have now been freed. Their confinement was ordered just days before they are to travel to Delhi to meet with Pakistan’s Sartaj Aziz, who will arrive in India on Sunday to hold talks on terror with National Security Advisor Ajit Doval.
Earlier in the day, separatists Yasin Malik, Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and Syed Ali Shah Geelani were placed under house arrest in Srinagar.
Defence experts say that Pakistan’s invitation to the separatists was a move to provoke India into cancelling the NSA-level talks but sources say that India has no intention of cancelling the talks.
The meeting between the top security officials will see the resumption of dialogue between the two countries after a year. Last July, India called off talks after Pakistan consulted Kashmiri separatists before a meeting of Foreign Secretaries. A thaw was managed a year later at an unexpected meeting in Ufa, Russia, in July between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Pakistani premier Nawaz Sharif, who agreed to restart talks.