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"I am sure that this meeting will be followed by more meetings in the future," Shalom said. "We hope that finally it will lead to full diplomatic relations with Pakistan as we would like it with all Muslim and Arab countries."
Israel has diplomatic relations with only four Muslim countries - Turkey, Jordan, Egypt and Mauritania.
"I think there was a very major breakthrough today in the relations between us and Pakistan," Shalom told Israel Radio.
"Of course, we ultimately want diplomatic relations, but we decided that from now on, the relations will be open, the relations will be good," he said. "Pakistan, as the second largest Muslim country after Indonesia, undoubtedly has value of great importance, has central value."
Shalom praised Pakistan's president, Gen. Perves Musharraf, for initiating the meeting, and said the Pakistanis had informed the Palestinians about it. The Israeli foreign minister also said that ties with Pakistan, which has long taken a hard line against Israel, have no bearing on the "good relations" Israel has with India.
The meeting was expected to be followed by confidence-building measures, such as a relaxation of Pakistan's ban against travel to Israel, an Israeli official said. Shalom said he and Kasuri had decided to take several diplomatic steps that are still in the initial stages. He refused to elaborate, but suggested that the countries may begin by sending ministerial delegations.
"There is no conflict whatsoever between Israel and Pakistan and no logical reason why the two countries could not have a constructive and positive bilateral relationship," Foreign Ministry spokesman Mark Regev said in Jerusalem.
Shalom and Kasuri informally met Wednesday night at a dinner in Istanbul, Israeli officials said.
The meeting was held at the Four Seasons Hotel, a former Ottoman prison, not far from Topkapi Palace. Security was extremely tight with Turkish and Israeli security officials searching bags and even disassembling photographers' cameras.
Zalman Shoval, a former Israeli ambassador to Washington and a foreign policy adviser to Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, said Israel would welcome relations with Islamabad, and has been quietly working toward that goal.
"There have been contacts on different levels with Pakistani officials for several years," Shoval told The Associated Press. "Even I myself had contacts with the Pakistani ambassador during my tenure in Washington and I always heard the willingness and desire to establish relations at the right moment," he said.
"Israel is of course interested in widening its official diplomatic relations with as many countries as possible and especially Muslim countries."
Turkey, an overwhelmingly Muslim country that has good relations with Israel, was chosen as a neutral venue. Pakistan has no diplomatic relations with Israel.
Pakistan was encouraged to set up the meeting following Israel's evacuation from the Gaza Strip, which was completed last week, Israeli officials said.
In Islamabad, the Dawn newspaper said Shalom and Kasuri were meeting "in response to Israel's keenness to establish contact with Pakistan."
Musharraf, a key U.S. ally in the Indian subcontinent, has been gradually moving toward conciliation with Israel, despite the influence of a powerful Islamic radical party in Pakistan.
The Pakistani president accepted an invitation to address an interfaith conference this month organized by the Council for World Jewry while he is in New York to attend the UN General Assembly.
The Arabic-language television station al-Jazeera has quoted Musharraf as calling Sharon a "great soldier and courageous leader" after announcing his plan to end Israel's occupation of Gaza. Pakistan says Israel must abandon all other territory it captured in the 1967 Six-Day War and clear the way for an independent Palestinian state.
Sporadic articles in the Pakistani press also have appeared in recent years urging a reassessment of Pakistan's refusal to consider diplomatic relations with Israel.
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