Expectations from Sharif meeting low: PM

Expectations from a meeting with Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif have "to be toned down", Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told US President Barack Obama following a terror attack in Jammu and Kashmir that left 12 people, including armymen, dead earlier in the week.

Manmohan Singh told Obama in a summit held here Friday that "the expectations have to be toned down given the terror arm which is still active in our subcontinent" and terrorists' presence "still remain focused in Pakistan".

Affirming their deep concern over the continuing threat posed by terrorism, a joint statement not only "strongly condemned" the Sep 26 attack, but also called for Pakistan to work toward bringing the perpetrators of the November 2008 Mumbai attacks to justice.

Terrorists had mounted a brazen attack on an army camp and a police station in Jammu region Sep 26. The three attackers were killed after a nine-hour long gunbattle.

Ahead of a meeting Sunday with Manmohan Singh, Nawaz Sharif said Islamabad stood ready to "re-engage with India in a substantive and purposeful dialogue."

"I am looking forward to meeting Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to make a new beginning," he said addressing the UN general assembly in New York

Saying that he was looking forward to meeting Manmohan Singh "to make a new beginning" Sharif suggested that the two countries had a "solid basis to do that" building on the Lahore Accord signed in 1999

Noting that the accord "contained a road map for the resolution of our differences through peaceful negotiations," Sharif said he was "committed to working for a peaceful and economically prosperous region."