Real opportunity for Trump to strengthen Indo-US ties

Washington: The Trump administration has a "real opportunity" to build on the strong foundation of Indo-US ties that has been laid by three previous governments, a former national security advisor has said.

"I think we have already started it and, again, on a bipartisan basis. (Former) president (Bill) Clinton actually started the first outreach to India. Bush administration build on it in terms of the Civil Nuclear deal. The Obama administration pursued it," Stephen Headley, a former Bush-era national security advisor told members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee during a Congressional hearing.

"We all did that because we saw India emerging as a major global player and wanted it to be with us in maintaining that US-led international order, not undermining it," he told Senators in response to a question.

"So I think the foundation is laid and I think there is a real opportunity for the Trump administration to build on that because India is increasingly a player and it is in our interest for them to be so since we share a lot of common values," Headley said.

Meanwhile, former secretary of state Madeline Albright echoed his statement and said, "We are the worlds oldest democracy. They are the largest. We have an lot in common".

"I think that the bipartisan approach that Stephen described, was great to go to India with former president Clinton and then to have it be picked up and it goes to the business that we have been saying earlier.

"You cannot have a Democratic foreign policy and a Republican one. And things kind of take longer to evolve and so I really do think that it is an important relationship by location as well as by character of what the country is about," Albright added.

From Lalit K Jha