NEW DELHI: Responding to the Indian opposition Bhartiya Janata Party’s accusation that the Indian government was resuming talks with Pakistan after being pressed by the US, former spymaster B Raman has claimed Washington actually pressed Pakistan to accept India’s offer for the foreign secretary-level talks on February 25.

Raman attributed Pakistan’s acceptance of the talks – “without making it a prestige issue” – to the nudging before and during the visit of US National Security Adviser General James Jones to Islamabad this week. He said initially the Pakistani Foreign Office was reluctant to accept the format India had proposed.

Raman – who has held a top post in the Indian spy agency, the Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) – quoted sources saying General Jones assured Islamabad that the foreign secretary-level meeting would not be a standalone or one-time affair. It would “mark the beginning of the process for de jure resumption of the composite dialogue”, he added.

“The well-crafted Indian move was intended to save both the countries from political embarrassment. By projecting that the proposed meeting was not aimed at resuming the formal composite dialogue, it sought to save India from facing public embarrassment on the fact that it had given up on its condition that the composite dialogue could not be resumed until Pakistan satisfied India on legal action against the conspirators of the November 2008 attacks on Mumbai,” Raman said.

Writing on the website of Outlook magazine, he contended that US President Barack Obama wanted resumption of the stalled talks between the two neighbours for the time being, but that he would assert more in the coming months.

“Its medium-term objective of persuading or even pressuring India to address Pakistani views on Kashmir and Afghanistan is likely to assert itself more and more as 2011 approaches. The Obama administration is more interested in addressing Pakistani concerns over India than Indian concerns over Pakistan,” Raman added.

He said India’s discussion of any issues with the Pakistani foreign secretary, while itself focusing on action against terrorism, was to help Islamabad convince the people of Pakistan that the talks amounted to “de facto resumption” of the composite dialogue.

Explaining US interest in the resumption of Indo-Pak talks, Raman said the US intends to undertake a series of military and political manoeuvres in the Afghanistan-Pakistan region in 2010 to pave the way for a thinning down of US involvement in Afghanistan, starting from 2011. He said that could be made smooth only if India and Pakistan do not oppose each other’s role in Kabul.

“The starting point of these military manoeuvres would be a proposed military offensive against the Afghan Taliban stronghold in the Marjah region of Helmand province in Afghanistan,” he added.