The summit meetings of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation are not the most exciting of gatherings and for years SAARC has been known for not delivering. But the latest summit held in the Maldives will be remembered, not for any substantive achievement of SAARC itself but for the fact that Indian-Pakistani ties achieved a level of stability not in evidence in recent years.
Though the meeting of the prime ministers of India and Pakistan has been a bit overshadowed by the controversy over Manmohan Singh calling his Pakistani counterpart Yousaf Raza Gilani a "man of peace," the two leaders did take a number of steps that bode well for the future of their bilateral tries.
Declaring that the time has come to write a "new chapter" in the history of two countries, New Delhi decided to move toward a preferential trade agreement with Pakistan under the conditions for the South Asian Free Trade Area, which is supposed to lead to zero customs duties on all traded goods by 2016.