US wants closer ties with India to meet South Asian challenges: Hillary

WASHINGTON - With the Obama Administration on an overdrive in reaffirming United States' commitment to a strategic partnership with India, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said Thursday that it was forging closer cooperation with New Delhi to meet challenges in South Asian region, including securing Afghanistan.
"India is a rising global power and already a regional power in Asia. Thus more the need to work closely with India to meet the immediate challenges in the neighbourhood including Afghanistan," she said at the launch of the first-ever Indo-US strategic dialogue.
Mrs. Clinton also indicated that U.S. looked favourably at India's bid for a permanent seat in an expanded UN Security Council, saying its rise would "certainly be a factor in any future consideration of the reforms" of the world body.
At a State Department briefing, a senior administration officials said after the strategic dialogue, "there will be deliverables," suggesting skeptics' perceptions would be best addressed "just by delivering results and by showing, in a concrete way, all of the various things that we're doing."
At the same time, Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Robert Blake said while India had a very important role in Afghanistan through its development programmes, the action against terrorism in the war-ravaged nation will not succeed without the aid of Pakistan.
"We have strongly welcomed the important role that India has played through its various reconstruction and development projects," he said said in a webcast from Washington, relayed through the state department website.
During the interaction with Blake, Indian journalists poured scorn on Pakistan, accusing Pakistan Army of having links with the militant's violence and saying that the sophisticated that US was supply to Pakistan would be used against India.
Blake said the arms being sent to Pakistan were meant to fight terrorism, not India.
He also brushed aside the Indian allegations about Pakistan Army's linkages. "I don't think it's so much that the Pakistan Army is involved in terror attacks; it's more that it is terrorist organizations inside Pakistan who have been involved in attacks, not only against India, but against the United States".
Today, during the dialogue with External Affairs Minister S M Krishna, the two sides vowed to strengthen cooperation in security, military, nuclear energy, climate change, education and agriculture.