Menon to discuss Mumbai terror attacks with US officials

Washington, Mar 8 (ANI): Foreign Secretary Shivshankar Menon will discuss the progress made in the Mumbai terror attacks with the US officials in Washington on Monday. Menon, who is in America, will meet the US Under Secretary of State William Burns and US President Barack Obama's Special Envoy for Pakistan and Afghanistan, Richard C. Holbrooke.

Issues like terrorism, the civil nuclear deal and the issues to be taken up at the upcoming G-20 meeting will be discussed during these meetings.

This is Menon's first high-level visit to Washington after Obama became US President.

Holbrooke met Menon last month and was briefed about the situation prevailing in South Asia from an Indian perspective.

Holbrooke then said that he was in New Delhi to seek the Indian leaderships' assessment of the situation in the region and to brief the latter about his visits to Pakistan and Afghanistan respectively.

He said this common threat comes from developments in Pakistan's remote Swat Valley, where the Taliban virtually calls the shots.

The Indian leadership is also said to have discussed the evidences that it had collected on the November 26, 2008 attacks on Mumbai with Holbrooke.

India has been urging the international community to put pressure on Islamabad to bring the perpetrators and attackers of the Mumbai carnage that claimed 179 lives to justice. It is also insisting that Pakistan must not allow terrorist activity to flower from its soil. (ANI)