A top US official who briefed a Pakistani business and media delegation at the White House last Thursday left no one in doubt that Washington's two-pronged talks with New Delhi and Islamabad -- to be held respectively in Washington and London from August 23 to 25 -- would be some sort of milestone in determining future American stakes in the region.

``Our hope is that the next round of our discussion with India and Pakistan at the end of this month will afford us the chance to make some very hard decisions here in the White House about whether or not we see sufficient progress,'' theunnamed official, said to be closely involved with the talks, told the Pakistani delegation.

The official also appeared to tie President Clinton's visit to the region to the outcome of the talks saying ``this next round will be the round where we will be in a position to say that we have made some real accomplishments... I hope it is a decisive round. 1998 is running out of dates so if we don't start to see something happening soon, the clock is moving forward, I can't make 1998 longer.''

The briefing was specially arranged by the Pakistani American League headed by businessman Nisar Chaudhury and some Pakistani journalists were invited for the event. Transcript of the briefing was available with the Pakistani media.

Although the official refused to give any insight into the current state of the ongoing talks, he said ``there is no secret to what the goalposts are.'' ``The benchmarks are CTBT, FMCT, resumption of Indo-Pak dialogue and dozen or so points. My shorthand port is: cap the arms race and geton with the bilateral dialogue to address all issues,'' the official said.

The official also provide broad indications of that there was very intense and deep negotiations going on exchanges which would suggest a fundamental change in positions when he spoke of the secrecy surrounding the talks.

``One of the features of our current conversations both with the governments of India and Pakistan that leaves me with hope is that the details of these discussions have remained secret. For diplomacy to work we need some quiet,'' the official said.

But he provided some indication of the tenor of the talks while saying ``what we are looking for is not a series of American demands or dictates. What we are looking for is try to find ways to help India and Pakistan curb their nuclear arms race.''

Significantly, he also identified the American non-proliferation goal as capping or curbing nuclear arms instead of reversing or turning back the events. Not for the first time the official made it clear that the USwould not play a direct mediatory role in the Kashmir issue but he acknowledged Washington's increasing interest in the matter, saying ``we recognize that the problems between India and Pakistan cannot simply be resolved by a resolution of arms control issues.''

``All arms control agreements in the world will not stop deterioration in a relationship between two countries that have deep bilateral differences, including Kashmir,'' he added, while making it very clear that the US could not be an instrument to solve the dispute.

In an indirect reference to the self-defeating approach, especially on part of Pakistani leadership and diplomats, the official said two sides needed to display political will to solve the problem.

``We can be helpful but we cannot provide that political will... the fundamental prerequisite for moving any negotiating process forward will have to be that the two parties are prepared to engage together directly to make something happen and if the leadership on both sides are preparedto take political risks in order to make something happen,'' he added.

The official said Washington hoped to see the two sides move on to a ``more creative politically-driven process.'' He was impressed by both the prime ministers who are ``men not afraid to take hard political decisions''.