New Delhi
30 November 2009
Sceptics in India will want to wait for Barack Obama to unveil his new Af-Pak
plan on Wednesday (India time) and to pore over American dossier on terror suspects
David Coleman Headley and Tahawwur Rana before weighing in on the success of Prime
Minister Manmohan Singh's recently concluded visit to Washington. But US Ambassador
to India Timothy Roemer moved in preemptively to reassure the sceptics that India and
the US are at the starting point of an upward trajectory in ties and India has a role to play
in regional and global affairs.
Roemer told a news conference here Monday that the India-US discourse on Pakistan is
centred around three issues: defeating terrorism, dismantling safe havens for terrorists,
and bringing the 26/11 perpetrators to justice. Towards that end, India and the US have
agreed to -- as per the Counterterrorism Cooperation Initiative -- to share actionable
intelligence. The pact deals with some 20 points such as maritime and amphibious
capabilities, coastal security, forensics, and mega-city policing.
The Singh-Obama talks centred around how to "make sure Pakistan effectively
prosecutes" the 26/11 terrorists. Both leaders also talked about their determination to
work together to defeat Lashkar-e-Tayyiba. "This is something that the US feels very
strongly about," Roemer said, for emphasis.
Roemer described Prime Minister Singh's visit to the US as a "watershed moment" in
the bilateral ties but Obama's overtures to China and delay in clinching the agreement
on the arrangements and procedures for reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel have raised
eyebrows here. Scepticism also stems due to the Group of Eight (G-8) attempt to curb
ENR (enrichment and reprocessing) technology to non-NPT signatories, appointment of
known India-baiter Robin Raphel to decide how the US will spend the 7.5 billion dollar
assistance to Pakistan in the next five years, and top US General Stanley McChrystal's
criticism of "increasing Indian influence" in Afghanistan.
A Washington Post report, which purports to give closely held details of Obama's new Af-
Pak strategy, has cited a senior US government official involved in the White House
review and others as saying that Washington has offered Islamabad an expanded
strategic partnership, including additional military and economic cooperation and an
effort to help reduce tensions between Pakistan and India. For his part, Roemer insisted
that the "pace, character and scope" of peace talks will be determined by India and
Pakistan alone.
No comments:
Post a Comment