PM not to visit Pakistan for Indo-Pak cricket series

   New Delhi: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh will not visit Pakistan for watching any of the matches of the forthcoming Indo-Pak cricket series, said official sources. Ministry of External Affairs Spokesperson, Navtej Sarna said that there were no plans for the Prime Minister to visit Pakistan for watching the matches.

   Earlier, there were reports that Pakistan had extended a formal invitation to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to visit Pakistan for the coming cricket series, adding that the latter had given his consent to pay a visit there to watch one of the matches. Pakistan's foreign office spokeswoman Tasneem Aslam had said that Pakistan had extended an invitation to Manmohan Singh to watch a match and it had now been accepted. "But it remains to be decided when he will come or which match he would prefer to watch," she said. Pakistan President General Pervez Musharraf had also, in a television interview yesterday, extended invitation to Singh to watch one of the matches saying, it would boost the ongoing peace process. "If he comes here and we do nothing about the peace process, I am afraid we are just wasting our time," Musharraf had said. Reports have been doing rounds that Singh had apparently agreed to visit Pakistan on February 11 to watch the second ODI between the two countries at Rawalpindi. However, the Prime Minister Office (PMO) in New Delhi had said it was "highly improbable for the PM to visit Pakistan in the name of cricket diplomacy" unless there was an agenda to discuss bilateral ties. Besides watching the ODI, Singh was also likely to hold separate one-to-one meetings with his counterpart Shaukat Aziz and Musharraf. Over the past few days, media reports have been making rounds that Musharraf would extend an invitation to Singh to watch a cricket match in Pakistan, in a return gesture to New Delhi which had invited Musharraf last year to watch an ODI in the Indian Capital.

Yasir Hameed taken ill, may miss first Test

   Lahore: Pakistan opener Yasir Hameed is unlikely to play the first Test against India as he is suffering from sever typhoid, the country's skipper Inzamam-ul-Haq said yesterday. "He has been diagnosed as suffering from severe typhoid and I am not sure if he would be able to recover in time for the first Test. We have spoken to him and he is still under treatment in Peshawar," The News quoted Inzamam as saying. Inzi said that Yasir was a front-runner in the strategy of the team management to open with Butt against India, but he unfortunately had fallen ill and had not joined the training camp. "Now, we have to think about the other options available to us," he added. This leaves Pakistan all-rounder Shoaib Malik with a good chance of retaining the responsibility of opening with Salman Butt, said the paper. Ruling out the possibilities of roping in Peshawar opener Rafatullah Mohmand to open against India, the Pakistani captain said: "He is still too raw and would not be the right choice for such a high pressure game." He further said that the idea of asking wicket-keeper Kamran Akmal to open was also dropped: "I don't think it would be fair on him because is our wicket-keeper and it would be asking too much of him to keep and then go and face the new ball. As it is his batting is very useful down the order." Meanwhile, the selectors are expected to announce today a 14- member squad for the first Test.

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