New Delhi, July 17 - Prime Minister Manmohan Singh returned home Friday from a four-day trip to France and Egypt, the highlight of which was a meeting with his Pakistani counterpart Yousuf Raza Gilani and a joint statement from the two leaders that gets the two countries to begin talks again.

Manmohan Singh's first stop was Paris where he attended the French National Day parade. From there, he went to the Egyptian coastal town of Sharm-el-Sheikh for the 15th Non Aligned Movement (NAM) summit. He met Gilani on the sidelines of the summit.