India says Prime Minister Narendra Modi is not scheduled to meet his Pakistani counterpart on the sidelines of an upcoming regional summit next week in Kyrgyzstan.
Indian Foreign Ministry spokesman Raveesh Kumar told reporters in New Delhi on Thursday that no "bilateral meeting" between the two was being planned during the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Bishkek.
"To the best of my knowledge, no meeting is being arranged between Prime Minister Modi and Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan on the sidelines of the SCO meet," media outlets quoted the spokesman as saying.
Modi and Khan will travel to the central Asian country to attend the SCO summit scheduled to be held on June 13-14.
Both India and Pakistan became members of the SCO in 2017, joining the forum founded in 2001 by Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.
The reluctance to meet comes even as both leaders exchanged warm words following Modis landslide re-election last month. Tensions have calmed since, with Khan saying in April that a Modi win at the polls could help settle the Kashmir showdown.
New Delhi has suspended bilateral dialogue with Islamabad since 2016 over its alleged support for militant groups in the disputed Kashmir region.
Relations nosedived in February when over 40 Indian paramilitaries were killed in a bomb attack in the Himalayan valley.
India has said Pakistan was to blame for the deaths of Indian troops in Kashmir which is divided between the two nuclear-armed states but is claimed in its entirety by both sides. Islamabad has denied any role in the bloodshed.
The Indian military conducted airstrikes inside Pakistan later in February against what was said to be a militant training camp belonging to the Pakistan-based Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM) militant group.
Pakistan retaliated and shot down an Indian fighter jet that it said had violated its airspace. It also captured an Indian pilot during that operation, but released him shortly in a “peace gesture.”
Tensions have since been running high between the two neighbors which have fought four wars since their partition in 1947, three of them over Kashmir.
India-controlled Kashmir has been the scene of constant clashes between New Delhi’s forces and armed groups seeking Kashmir’s independence or its merger with Pakistan.
India regularly accuses Pakistan of arming and training militants and allowing them across the restive frontier in an attempt to launch attacks. Pakistan strongly rejects the accusation.
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