India, Pakistan vow to fight crime together

Officials of the arch-rivals' crime-fighting agencies, meeting in New Delhi after a gap of 17 years, also discussed setting up a South Asian police agency on the lines of Europe's Europol.

They agreed to appoint special liaison officers between India's Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) and Pakistan's Federal Investigation Agency (FIA).

"We look forward to increasing cooperation in larger areas of mutual interest and ensuring criminals of the two countries do not have any kind of respite from the two agencies," CBI Director Vijay Shanker said at a joint news conference with the FIA chief.

Human trafficking and the smuggling of goods, narcotics and counterfeit currency routinely take place along the India-Pakistan border which is already troubled by an Islamic insurgency in the disputed northern territory of Kashmir.

The issue of Dawood Ibrahim, India's most wanted criminal, against whom Interpol has issued a major alert notice and who is believed to be in Pakistan, was also discussed.

A joint statement issued after the talks said the two sides had decided that "all efforts will be made ... for expeditious disposal of pending Interpol references".