The United States and India must overcome any lingering doubts about each other as they forge a broader partnership to fight world problems, US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said here Thursday.
The chief US diplomat made the remarks as she and Indian Foreign Minister S.M. Krishna began chairing a day of high-level talks in Washington that will pave the way for a visit to India by US President Barack Obama later this year.
US policymakers across the political spectrum support developing a broad alliance with India, which had uneasy relations with Washington throughout the Cold War.
But Clinton broached lingering doubts in the relationship.
She echoed Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s call, during a red-carpet visit here in November, that the world’s “leading democracies must play a leading role in building a shared destiny for all human kind.
“To fulfill it, we must not only build on areas of agreements but frankly address doubts that remain on both sides.
“Doubts among some Indians that the United States only sees India or mainly sees India in the context of Afghanistan and Pakistan, or that we will hasten our departure from Afghanistan, leaving India to deal with the aftermath.
“Doubts in America that India has not fully embraced its role in regional or global affairs or will not make the economic reforms needed to foster additional progress,” she told delegates seated around a U-shaped table.
The two sides were represented by ministers or high-level officials who deal with counter-terrorism, education, science and technology, the environment and commerce.
The United States held similar “strategic dialogue” talks with Afghanistan last month and Pakistan in March. The United States also has broad partnerships with China, Brazil and Indonesia.
Obama is expected to make an unusual visit to the State Department to take part personally in the dialogue’s reception, which will also include members of the increasingly influential Indian-American community.
In November, he invited Singh to the White House for the first state dinner of the US leader’s presidency.
Top White House economic advisor, Lawrence Summers, said it was an anomaly that India and the United States did not have closer relations.
“It is the confident expectation of the government of the United States that that will be very different in the 21st century,” Summers told the US-India Business Council on Wednesday.
Clinton called for both countries to build on a multi-faceted relationship that already includes close cooperation on fighting terrorism, empowering women, eradicating disease, and efforts to improve crop forecasting.
She noted that two-way trade grew to 66 billion dollars last year, up about 10 times from 1990, and that the United States holds more military exercises with India than any other country.
She praised the dynamism of the private sectors in both countries, but said both Washington and New Delhi must do more to remove red tape.
Relations between India and the United States improved markedly under former president George W. Bush, who spearheaded a landmark agreement that allows New Delhi access to civilian nuclear technology.
India had been a pariah after declaring itself a nuclear weapons power in 1998 with tests that were reciprocated by Pakistan. Both countries refuse to sign the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
While some lawmakers from his Democratic Party initially opposed the nuclear cooperation deal, the Obama administration has forged ahead with it, completing arrangements in March for the reprocessing of nuclear material.
But the United States still wants India to approve legislation that would limit compensation payments from nuclear suppliers in the event of a nuclear accident.
Krishna, addressing the US-India Business Council earlier this week, vowed to push ahead despite controversy over the bill in parliament.
Krishna started off here Thursday by calling for cooperating “more closely than ever before” in fighting the terrorism that has hit both countries.
He cited both the deadly 2008 siege in Mumbai and the more recent botched attack in New York’s Times Square, both of which were linked to India’s neighbor Pakistan.
“Given the fact that the groups who preach the ideology of hatred and violence are increasingly coalescing, sharing resources and operating as one, it is incumbent upon all of us to focus our efforts laser-like on every one of them,” Krishna said.
His remarks appeared to urge Washington to press Islamabad to crack down on all the various militant groups in Pakistan.
