Saeed, the founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba, is accused by India of masterminding the Mumbai attacks [ AFP]

The Indian foreign minister, SM Krishna, has said the attack would be the focus of his forthcoming meeting with Shah Mehmood Qureshi, his Pakistani counterpart, at the UN General Assembly in New York.

He has called on Islamabad to charge the founder of the banned Lashkar-e-Taiba group, Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, with masterminding the attacks.

"My attempt would be to impress upon the Pakistan foreign minister the desirability of taking action against the brains behind the Mumbai attack," Krishna said.

The meeting between Qureshi and Krishna, on September 26, will be preceded by talks between their foreign secretaries, or most senior diplomats.

Krishna's comments came just hours after Pakistani police said Saeed would be arrested for propagating jihad and collecting funds for a charity he heads.

"We hope to arrest him soon," Hafiz Mohammad Irfan, a senior police official in Faisalabad, told the Reuters news agency.

Under pressure

Police in the city of Faisalabad lodged two complaints against Saeed this week for delivering a speech to his supporters last month in which he urged jihad, or holy war, and appealed for funds for his Jamaat-ud-Dawa charity.

A spokesman for Saeed said that authorities were acting under pressure from India.

India has been demanding action against Saeed and other Pakistan-based fighters before it will resume a formal peace process, broken off by New Delhi after the Mumbai attack.

Speaking in London, Asif Ali Zardari, the Pakistani president, said Islamabad was seeking a co-operative relationship with India and reiterated Pakistan's call for a resumption of formal peace talks.

He declined to go into details on Saeed, but said the action against him showed "our determination to prosecute anyone who is inclined towards an aggressive mindset.

P Chidambaram, the Indian home minister, told an Indian news channel that even if Saeed were arrested on another charge, it would represent "significant progress" if Pakistan used this as an opportunity to question him about the Mumbai attack.

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