INDIA is ready to have a further round of talks at the level of Foreign Secretaries, as a follow-up to the talks on February 25. This has been indicated by the Indian Foreign Office during a briefing on the Indian Foreign Minister's visit to China. However, the Indian Foreign Office feels that Pakistan must respond to the Indian invitation. Once again, India has dragged up the issue of the Mumbai attacks, claiming that Pakistan has yet to respond to the dossiers India presented on February 25. However, India claims the 'channels are open'. As previous contacts, the last as recent as the joint Indus Waters Commission which met in Lahore, showed, India remains obdurate over all issues, and wants to use these occasions to prove its regional hegemony. The talks are held only to satisfy the USA, which believes that if the two nuclear-armed South Asian neighbours were to reduce mutual tension, they could both do more in the USA's so-called war on terror, and India would be left free to act as a regional counterweight against China. Pakistan would do well to think over the utility of these talks. India, as recently as the last round of these talks, showed no sign of any readiness to talk about Kashmir, which India has illegally occupied for over six decades, in violation of the UN Security Council resolutions on the subject. Also, India did not show willingness to talk seriously about its theft of water from Pakistan, or any matter of substance. In fact, the talks could not restart the composite dialogue which India had broken off after it made the wild and completely baseless accusation that Pakistan was behind the Mumbai attacks. Though both countries' Prime Ministers will be in Washington later this month for the Nuclear Summit, a meeting has not even been scheduled, let alone an agenda fianlised. Pakistan must not bend to the wishes of a foreign power, but should only meet with India if it is willing to have result-oriented talks on all issues, with Kashmir being the foremost.