Pakistan and India will hold talks on two subjects of the composite dialogue next week in Islamabad and New Delhi, according to the agreed schedule for the new round. The two countries had issued the agreed schedule of the fourth round of composite dialogue last month.
Talks on Wullar Barrage will be held in New Delhi on June 26-27 and on Promotion of Friendly Exchanges in Islamabad on June 28-29, according to the agreed schedule. The two sides have held a total of 11 rounds of talks on Wullar Barrage dispute so far. The last round was held in June last year.
The dispute emerged in 1984 after India planned to build a barrage on outfall of the Jhelum River in the occupied Kashmir with a storage capacity of 300,000 acres feet without informing Pakistan, as was required under the treaty. India started building the dam, which was around 439 feet high and 40 feet wide barrage in the Baramullah district to create a link with Srinagar but halted its construction in 1987 when Islamabad had opposed the move.
Pakistan maintained that the project violated its rights as a lower riparian country granted by the Indus Waters Treaty.
However, India has not abandoned the project and says the barrage is aimed at facilitating navigation between Baramullah and Srinagar through the Wullar Barrage in the Jammu and Kashmir. Pakistan says that the Indus Water Treaty allowed a storage capacity of only 10,000 acre-feet while the project envisaged storage of 324,000 acre-feet, which was 32 times what the treaty allowed, according to Pakistan.