The US and Pakistan hope to resolve the recent tensions in bilateral relationships as their representatives meet for the three-day Strategic Dialogue here.
The dialogue comes closely after the killing of three Pakistani soldiers in a NATO strike prompted Islamabad to enforce a brief closure of a key supply route to Afghanistan.
"As you all know, we're coming through a period of tension in the US-Pakistan relationship, and the Strategic Dialogue provides a venue to really exchange views with the
Pakistanis on a strategic level and to move beyond these tensions in the relationship," said Frank Ruggiero, Deputy Director, Special Representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan.
Ruggiero briefed reporters at a special news
conference on the eve of the third round of Strategic Dialogue between the US and Pakistan that kicks off on Wednesday.
The US-Pakistan partnership is essential to advancing our strategic goals in the region in South Asia, he said.
"Our relations with the US are excellent but both sides have complaints and reservations and we will try to remove of those during the strategic dialogue," Pakistan's Ambassador to the US, Hussein Haqqani, told a group of reporters ahead of the meeting.
The Pakistani delegation led by its Foreign Minister, Shah Mahmood Qureshi, includes the country's powerful Army Chief Ashfaq Parvez Kayani.
The American delegation is led by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. The devastating floods in Pakistan and the aid efforts for the victims would be an important component of the talks.
The dialogue itself is broken down into 13 working groups, all of which would be holding separate meetings over the next two days, before they hold the common session at the State Department on Friday which would be jointly addressed by Clinton and Qureshi.
This would be the third round of Strategic Dialogue between the two countries this year.