Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise "goodwill" visit to arch-rival Pakistan on Friday

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi made a surprise "goodwill" visit to arch-rival Pakistan on Friday, with the first such trip in a decade seen as a step towards normalizing ties between the nuclear-armed neighbors.

Modi, who announced the trip via Twitter while in Kabul, met in Lahore with his Pakistani counterpart Nawaz Sharif, who was celebrating his birthday and the wedding of a grand-daughter, for a two-and-a-half hour visit seen by analysts as a positive step.

A meeting of their top diplomats is now set for January in Islamabad, indicating a potential thaw in ties between two countries that have fought three wars, along with countless close calls, since gaining independence from Britain in 1947.

Television footage showed an Indian Air Force jumbo jet land at Lahore's Allama Iqbal International Airport in the late afternoon on Friday, moments after Sharif himself arrived by helicopter.

Pakistan's Foreign Secretary Aizaz Ahmad Chaudhry later told a news conference that it was a "purely goodwill visit".

"Both leaders agreed that it was extremely important that the leaders of both countries should understand each other's point of view so that the doors of prosperity could open for their people," Chaudhry said.

He said Modi gave Sharif birthday greetings and the meeting took place in a "cordial atmosphere", and added that the two countries' foreign secretaries will meet in Islamabad next month.

Senior Indian officials and politicians also spoke positively of the meeting, with foreign ministry spokesman Vikas Swarup tweeting that the meeting had set a "positive spirit in the neighbourhood".

Foreign Minister Sushma Swaraj, meanwhile, tweeted: "Neighbors’ relations should be like this."

The last visit to Pakistan by an Indian prime minister was in 2004 by then leader Atal Bihari Vajpayee, who is credited with bringing about a thaw in relations with Islamabad.

Modi and Sharif have had a stop-start diplomatic relationship since the Indian premier's surprise invitation to Sharif to his inauguration in May 2014.