India, US discuss steps to resolve the diplomatic standoff

India and the US tonight discussed the specific steps to resolve the situation arising out of the arrest and strip search of senior Indian diplomat Devyani Khobragade which has evoked sharp reaction here.
The steps were discussed during a telephone call made by US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs Wendy Sherman to Foreign Secretary Sujatha Singh to follow up on the conversation Secretary of State John Kerry had with National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon yesterday.
During the 20-25 minute conversation, Sherman and Singh discussed the specific steps to resolve the issue even as the US Under Secretary of State distanced from US prosecutor Preet Bharara who had defended the arrest of the senior Indian diplomat in New York last week on visa fraud charge.

According to sources, India got positive signals from the US which had yesterday termed the incident as "isolated" and not indicative of "close and mutually respectful" bilateral ties.
Unfazed by the outrage over the arrest and subsequent treatment of Khobragade, Bharara, the tough-talking India-born US prosecutor, defended the action against the IFS officer and confirmed that her maid's family has been "evacuated" from India.
India hit back at Bharara, accusing him of interfering with the Indian legal system and asserting that the arrest was not in keeping with the Vienna Convention on diplomatic immunity.
A 1999 batch officer, 39-year-old Khobragade, India's Deputy Consul General in New York, was arrested on December 12 on visa fraud charges by the State Department's diplomatic security bureau, and then handed over to the US Marshals Service (USMS).

Khobragade was taken into custody as she was dropping her daughter to school before being released on a USD 250,000 bond after pleading not guilty in court.