Lalit K Jha/ PTI / Washington May 15, 2009, 09:23 IST
US President Barack Obama believes that India is a global power and thus wants to establish a strategic relationship with New Delhi to meet the global challenges of the 21st century along with the regional issues, a top US diplomat has said.
Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in his confirmation hearing, Robert Blake, who has been named Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian affairs, told American Senators that Obama is committed to strengthen the existing strategic partnership between the two countries.
"President Obama has said that the United States sees India as a global power and as a very important partner for us in addressing the challenges that we will face in the 21st century," Blake said when Senator Tom Casey asked about future of Indo-US relationship under the new administration.
"So our task will be to try to strengthen the strategic partnership that exists between the United States and India, to base that on our converging values and our converging interests," he said.
Acknowledging that civic nuclear deal is now a landmark agreement between the two nations, Blake told the lawmakers: "I would steer you to just point out that we think that we can cooperate on a broad range of fronts, not only bilaterally but to address some of these new challenges such as global climate change, the global trade talks and things like that."
As such, the Obama Administration is looking for a more enhanced strategic partnership with this important country — India.
"If confirmed, I will be working with members of the administration to define exactly the parameters of that. We hope to have some announcements for you fairly soon on that," Blake said.
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