Daily Times

ISLAMABAD: The long anticipated reopening of the Indian and Pakistani consulates in Karachi and Mumbai in 2006 was delayed as Islamabad is yet to get its temporary office ready, while India had completed renovation work on it building and was waiting from a green light from New Delhi.

According to the joint statement issued during President Pervez Musharraf’s visit to India in April last year, both countries agreed to open the consulates on New Year’s Day. The reopening could now take some time since Pakistan is still in the process of finalising the temporary location where the office would be based.

According to the agreement, both consulates were to have opened simultaneously. “There are some logistical issues in Mumbai that are still being finalised. As much as we would have liked to open the consulates in time, the delay was unavoidable, said Foreign Office Spokesperson Tasnim Aslam.