Reuters AlertNet Lite - REFILE-Pakistan-India peace talks planned despite bombings

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INDIA-PAKISTAN/TRAIN (PICTURE, GRAPHIC)

20 Feb 2007 03:52:47 GMT
Source: Reuters

NEW DELHI, Feb 20 (Reuters) - Pakistan's foreign minister will arrive in India on Tuesday for peace talks, in a sign the bombing of an India-Pakistan train that killed at least 66 people had failed to aggravate ties between the nuclear rivals.

Foreign Minister Khursheed Mehmood Kasuri will arrive in New Delhi on Tuesday afternoon, a spokesman for the Pakistan High Commission said.

Suitcase bombs exploded on a train connecting New Delhi to the northern Pakistani city of Lahore, sparking a fire on Monday that raked through two carriages in what appeared to be an attempt to undermine a peace process between the two countries.

Rather than the finger-pointing that has often quickly surfaced after past attacks, both governments condemned the bombings and the prime ministers of the two countries phoned each other on Monday.

Pakistan President Pervez Musharraf said on Monday the attacks should not undermine peace efforts.

"We will not allow elements which want to sabotage the ongoing peace process to succeed in their nefarious designs," Musharraf said in a statement.

While the attack occured in India, the majority of the victims in the Samjhauta Express were Pakistanis.

PASSENGER DETAINED

One person in one of the two coaches that caught fire was detained in connection with the midnight blasts on the train about 80 km (50 miles) north of New Delhi, Railways Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav was quoted by the Press Trust of India as saying.

The Samjhauta rail service was halted after an attack on New Delhi's parliament in late 2001 and it started up again in 2004.

A Hindu nationalist group threatened to disrupt the service in 2000, but suspicion for this attack is also likely to fall on Muslim extremists opposed to the peace process.

Many newspapers criticised on Tuesday what they said were security lapses that allowed bombers to board what is meant to be one of the best guarded trains in India.

Some commentators said a perceived lack of security could become a political issue for Manmohan's Singh's government, which faces several state elections early this year.

Washington condemned the bombing and "those who seek to undermine the progress in relations between the two countries," White House spokesman David Almacy said.

Police said that while the explosions were small, they were intended to cause fires on at least four of the train's coaches.

Like all Indian trains, most of the windows in the lower- class compartments were barred with metal rods, meaning many people were trapped inside the carriages.

At least 13 people were also injured, with several moved to New Delhi hospital, their faces burnt and bandaged.

The rest of the train, which had been carrying around 600 passengers, continued to the border town of Attari where passengers were transferred to a Pakistani train.

The attack happened days before the fifth anniversary of a fire on a train carrying Hindu pilgrims that killed 59 people in Godhra in the western state of Gujarat, and sparked communal riots in which around 2,500 people died, most of them Muslims.

That fire was blamed at the time on Muslims, but some subsequent inquiries have said it could have been accidental.

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Last updated:Tue Feb 20 03:56:27 2007