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		</div><p>India’s Narendra Modi has made a surprise visit to Pakistan, his first trip as prime minister to the Islamic nation that has been India’s long-standing rival in the region.</p>
<p>The previously unannounced visit is a potential sign of thawing relations between the two nuclear-armed neighbours. The two heads of government also had an unscheduled meeting at the Paris climate change talks earlier this month.</p>
<p>Since gaining independence from Britain in 1947, India and Pakistan have fought three wars, two of them over Kashmir, the Himalayan region that both countries claim.</p>
<p>Mr Modi landed on Friday afternoon in the eastern city of Lahore and met with his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif, state-run media reported. The visit coincides with Mr Sharif’s birthday and the wedding of his granddaughter.<br />
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<p>Security was beefed up at the Lahore International Airport shortly before Mr Modi’s arrival.</p>
<p>After spending about two hours with Mr Modi at his residence, Mr Sharif went to the Lahore airport along with Mr Modi to see him off.</p>
<p>The pair held a meeting in a “cordial and positive atmosphere” and they agreed to continue working for the welfare of people of their countries, Pakistan’s foreign secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry told reporters.</p>
<p>He said Mr Modi called Mr Sharif at about 11.30am on Friday and expressed his wish to visit Pakistan</p>
<p>“This is how this visit was suddenly planned,” he said. Mr Chaudhry described Mr Modi’s visit as a “gesture of good will” and hoped that it will help resolve all of their outstanding issues when the two sides resume talks in the near future.</p>
<p>One of the first public signs of the visit came on Friday morning when Mr Modi, during a stop in the Afghan capital of Kabul, tweeted that he is “looking forward to meeting” Mr Sharif in Lahore, “where I will drop by on my way back to Delhi.” He said he also called Mr Sharif and wished him happy birthday.</p>
<p>Mr Sharif’s sprawling residence had been colourfully decorated for his granddaughter’s wedding reception when Mr Modi arrived along with the Pakistani prime minister. The two leaders were later shown sitting together in a room looking happy and relaxed.</p>
<p>Analysts viewed the visit as a potential turning point in Pakistani-Indian relations.</p>
<p>“I think it is going to play a significant role in improving ties between the two South Asian arch-rivals,” said Amanullah Memon, a professor of international relations at Preston University in the Pakistani capital, Islamabad.</p>
<p>Amitabh Matto, an Indian foreign policy expert, described Modi’s birthday diplomacy visit as a “very positive step”.</p>
<p>“Any step toward trying to stabilise and provide a new beginning to India-Pakistan ties is welcome and needs to be supported by all those who believe that India and Pakistan have a common destiny and it is in their interest to fight together their common problems, including terrorism and economic under-development,” he said.</p>
<p>Tarun Vijay, a spokesman for Mr Modi’s Bharatiya Janata party, praised the visit as a sign of statesmanship. “This is the best Christmas gift to the mankind which believes in peace and amity. He has risen to the commanding heights of being a statesman who can take a bold step surprising his friends and foes but melting ice in the relations,” he said</p>
<p>After a year of rising tensions, top security officials from India and Pakistan held talks in Thailand’s capital earlier in December, discussing a range of issues, including Kashmir and ways to maintain peace along the countries’ shared border. Also, two weeks ago, Indian external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj visited Pakistan to attend a meeting on Afghanistan.</p>
<p>India accuses Pakistan of arming and training insurgents fighting for Kashmir’s independence from India or its merger with Pakistan, a charge Islamabad denies. More than 68,000 people have been killed in ongoing Kashmir violence, which began in 1989.</p>
<p>A ceasefire along the so-called “line of control” that serves as the border between Indian and Pakistani-held Kashmir has largely held since 2003, but cross-border firing and minor skirmishes are fairly common, with each side routinely blaming the other.</p>
<p>Mirwaiz Umar Farooq, a key separatist leader in the Indian portion of Kashmir, said: “It’s a welcome step. We hope that it is followed by a consistent policy of engagement to resolve the Kashmir dispute. India and Pakistan have to evolve a mechanism to involve the core party to the issue – that is the Kashmiri people.”</p>
<p>India also wants Pakistan to bring to justice Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, the alleged mastermind of the 2008 Mumbai terror attacks that killed 168 people. Saeed lives openly in Pakistan and often appears on TV interviews; the government claims it lacks the evidence to charge him.</p>
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