ISLAMABAD: Pakistan has invited External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj to visit the country to attend the groundbreaking ceremony of the Kartarpur corridor next week, Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Saturday.
A long-pending demand of the Sikh community to build a religious corridor linking India's border district of Gurdaspur with a historic gurudwara in Pakistan may finally be fulfilled with both the countries announcing that stretches would be developed in their respective areas.
Prime Minister Imran Khan will inaugurate the groundbreaking ceremony of the facilities on the Pakistani side on November 28.
Apart from Swaraj, Qureshi also invited Punjab Chief Minister Amarinder Singh and cabinet minister Navjot Singh Sidhu to the ceremony.
"On behalf of Pakistan I have extended an invitation to External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, Capt Amarinder Singh & Navjot Singh Sidhu to attend the groundbreaking ceremony at Kartarpura on Nov 28, 2018," Qureshi tweeted.
Official sources said that proper invitation letters were also dispatched to them.
India's Cabinet cleared a proposal Thursday to develop a corridor from Dera Baba Nanak in Punjab's Gurdaspur district to the International Border to facilitate Indian pilgrims to visit Gurdwara Darbar Sahib in Kartarpur, Pakistan.
Amarinder Singh has invited Chaudhry Pervaiz Elahi, the speaker of the Assembly in Pakistan's Punjab province, to attend a similar ceremony on the Indian side on November 26, according to officials here.
Pakistan Foreign Office on Friday said the "Kartarpur Spirit can be a step forward in the right direction from conflict to cooperation, animosity to peace and enmity to friendship."