Clinton Visit Opens New Chapter in Indo-US Relations

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Clinton Visit Opens New Chapter in Indo-US Relations

As U.S. President Bill Clinton wound up his five-day official visit to India and left Mumbai for Islamabad on the morning of March 25, both countries agreed that a new chapter had been opened in their bilateral relations.

Clinton, who flew to New Delhi on the evening of March 19 and formally started his India visit on March 21, was the first U.S. president to visit India in the past 22 years.

After two hours of summit talks on Tuesday morning, Clinton and Indian Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee signed a joint statement titled "India-U.S. Relations: A Vision for the 21st Century," which said that the two leaders "resolve to create a closer and qualitatively new relationship" between the two countries in the new century.

The statement said that in the new century, India and the United States would be partners in peace, with a common interest in and complementary responsibility for ensuring regional and international security.

Clinton and Vajpayee also agreed that a regular, wide-ranging dialogue is important for achieving the goal of establishing closer and multifaceted relations between India and the United States and for the two countries to work jointly for promotion of peace and prosperity in the 21st century.

They agreed on a number of steps to intensify and institutionalize the dialogue between India and the United States, which include regular bilateral summits between the prime minister of India and the U.S. president, an Annual Foreign Policy Dialogue between foreign ministers of both countries, the continuance of the ongoing Dialogue on Security and Non-proliferation, Foreign Office Consultations and regular meetings of the existing Joint Working Group on Counter-terrorism.

The two sides also decided to institutionalize their bilateral economic dialogue by setting up a Coordinating Group and an Indo-U.S. Working Group on Trade, initiating Indo-U.S. Commercial Dialogue and an Indo-U.S. Financial and Economic Forum. They also agreed to set up a Joint Consultative Group on Clean Energy and Environment and an Indo-U.S. Science and Technology Forum.

However, the two leaders also acknowledged that major differences exist between the two countries on some issues, especially the nuclear non-proliferation issue. Meanwhile, some political parties and some organizations staged protests in New Delhi and other parts of the country against the visit.

"India and the United States share a commitment to reducing and ultimately eliminating nuclear weapons, but we have not always agreed on how to reach this common goal," said the statement.

"The United States believes India should forgo nuclear weapons.India believes that it needs to maintain a credible minimum nuclear deterrent in keeping with its own assessment of its security needs," the document added.

The statement didn't refer to the Kashmir issue directly, only saying: "We acknowledge that tensions in South Asia can only be resolved by the nations of South Asia."

During the two leaders' meeting with the press after the signing of the statement, however, Clinton said that he would convey the same message to India and Pakistan on the issue of Kashmir: respect the line of control, show restraint, stand against violence and restore the dialogue.

India had insisted Pakistan first abandon its support of "cross-border terrorism" and anti-India propaganda before any dialogue can be resumed between the two neighbors.

On Wednesday morning, Clinton delivered a 35-minute speech to a joint session of both houses of the Indian Parliament, in which he described India and the United States as "natural allies" in the post-Cold War era and claimed that the U.S. wants India to be strong, secure, united and be a force for a safer, more prosperous and more democratic world.

Clinton made another attempt to persuade India to give up its nuclear project, asking the latter to draw lesson from America's Cold War experience, when its nuclear arms race with the former Soviet Union caused a huge waste of money and resources and hindered its economic growth.

Clinton said he had not come to south Asia to mediate the dispute over Kashmir, but once again urged New Delhi to take the initiative to restore peace talks with Pakistan.

He also hinted that the U.S. remains willing and ready to play a sort of role in the resolution of the Kashmir issue, just as it did in the Indo-Pakistani Kargil conflict last year.

During Clinton's visit, India and the U.S. signed a series of pacts concerning sci-tech collaboration and exchange and environmental protection. According to these pacts, an Indo-U.S. Science and Technology Forum will be established to facilitate and promote interaction of government, academia and industry in science, technology and other related areas, while the U.S. government will provide 45 million U.S. dollars for clean energy and water projects in India as part of a 250-million-dollar environmental assistance package for south Asia.

Clinton also announced on Friday that his administration would give 5 million dollars to India for research on AIDS, tuberculosis and other infectious diseases and offer another 5 million dollars to Internet spread in rural India.

On Thursday, India and U.S. firms signed in New Delhi agreements worth 2 billion dollars on various sectors including information technology, power and environment.

"India is a growing market and U.S. firms are very eager to enter into agreements and do business with Indian companies," said U.S. Commerce Secretary William Daley at the signing ceremony. "We are also willing to provide our experience and expertise to the Indian companies."

With some more agreements signed in Mumbai on Friday, the United States agreed to provide a one-billion-dollar credit to Exim Bank of India and the Small Industrial Development Bank of India for lending to small and medium industries in the country for their development, while U.S. and Indian companies reached 12 deals involving a total U.S. investment of 2 billion dollars in India, mainly in the areas of information technology, biotechnology, pharmaceutics, power and environment.

The Indians also raised the issue of lifting sanctions imposed against the country after the 1998 nuclear tests, and the Americans responded that while some steps have already been taken,some others would be taken in the future. But no clear timetable was given on this issue.

Political analysts here said that the U.S. president's visit toIndia, generally speaking, was a quite successful one, which endeddecades of estrangement in the Indo-U.S. relations. And they believed that the Indian side felt quite satisfied at the outcome of the visit.

However, they warned, differences between the two countries on certain issues, if not addressed in a timely and appropriate manner, would inevitably harm the smooth development of the newly-forged partnership.


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	As U.S. President Bill Clinton wound up his five-day official visit to India and left Mumbai for Islamabad on the morning of March 25, both countries agreed that a new chapter had been opened in their bilateral relations.




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