Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani has demanded from the US a nuclear deal similar to the one Washington has made with India, assuring that the nuclear proliferation network of its scientist A Q Khan was broken and will not be repeated.
'Building a world that is more free and equal and more just also means forging a more effective regional framework in Asia and the Pacific. And, that is why I am going to work with America's partners around the world, not just to defeat terrorism, but also to prevent the kind of violence that we saw over the weekend in India and to promote political stability and unleash economic prosperity,' Obama said.
Prime Minister Syed Yousaf Raza Gilani, who met US President George W Bush in Washington on Monday, did not rule out adding more muscle to military operations in the war on terror while Bush said Islamabad must do "more" on this front.
Maryland House Majority Leader, Kumar Barve, 49, the longest-serving Indian American legislator who was first elected in 1990, and has served in this leadership position since 2003 making him one of the most influential politicians in the state, has pleaded guilty to driving under the influence of alcohol, and under a plea agreement received no jail time but only unsupervised probation and ordered to pay a fine of $200 and court costs.
On the eve of the 15th summit of the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation to be held in Colombo August 2-3, the US has said it does not believe SAARC is ineffectual and irrelevant and a farce as some in the West and in the region itself contend--who dismiss it as nothing but a group photo-op every few years--and is confident it can grow to be as powerful and influential as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations.
Congressman Jim McDermott, who represents Washington state -- who incidentally voted against the enabling legislation also known as the Hyde Act two years ago -- said, "The likelihood of Congress taking up the nuclear issue again before the end of the year is, it will be very difficult."
Better diplomatic relations between India and Pakistan are vital for the United States to succeed in its war against Taliban militants in Afghanistan, Democratic Presidential nominee Barack Obama has said.Obama said the porous border between Afghanistan and Pakistan is making it difficult for US troops to decisively defeat the Taliban as the militants often escape by crossing the border.
Pro-deal lawmakers like Congressman Gary Ackerman continue to express their angst over the close India-Iran ties. The lawmakers have warned that this could be a spoiler to the envisaged strategic partnership between Washington and New Delhi.
In an exclusive interview with rediff.com, Richard Boucher, the Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs, who is the Bush administration's point man for the subcontinent and who has taken charge of pushing the deal in the US Congress, said, "We are going to work with the Indians, we are going to work with the Congress and we are going to take this as far as we can go."
Neel Kashkari, who was the Senior Advisor to US Treasury Secretary Henry M Paulson, was nominated by President Bush to the post of Assistant Secretary of Treasury for International Affairs and has been confirmed by the US Senate.
Thirty-two young leaders from India and Pakistan who have just completed a three-week conflict resolution programme in Maine under the auspices of The Seeds of Peace programme, were felicitated at the State Department by Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte and Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Richard Boucher, who hailed them as the leaders of tomorrow and the catalysts of peace in a region beset by conflict for far too long.
Senator Joseph R Biden, Jr, the chairman of the powerful US Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who will be the key player in moving the US-India civilian nuclear agreement forward in Congress if India succeeds in getting in back on the Congressional court expeditiously, says it may be possible to get the deal consummated this year, but that it's going to be in terms of a best-case scenario a photo-finish.
"We have to look out of the box... we have to look at innovative ways of resolution (to the Kashmir issue). We have our minds open to such issues," Pakistan Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi said on Friday while delivering a lecture at the Brookings Institution.
The Indian American community and US business that had lobbied feverishly for the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal, are euphoric over the recent developments where Prime Minister Manmohan Singh has decided to go ahead with the accord come what may and even in the wake of the Left coalition partners withdrawing their support and leaving the country in a state of political uncertainty.
Jindal's name has been surfaced as a potential running mate to Senator McCain but the Indian American head of a state has persistently ruled it out.
The pilot program will concentrate primarily on facilities in third countries, such as China and India, which produce much of the world's pharmaceutical raw materials, but are sometimes beyond the reach of US inspectors. The United States imported more than $2 trillion worth of products last year, an amount that exceeds the entire GDP of France and approximately $6,500 for every man, woman, and child in the US.
The campaign said that, "the committee is comprised of diverse American communities of supporters, including those from Asian-American, South-Asian American, and Pacific Islander background, who will help raise funds to elect Senator Barack Obama as president and to strengthen and expand the Democratic Party."
The United States Commission on International Religious Freedom -- a Congressionally mandated body -- has urged the US State Department "to reaffirm its past decision to deny a tourist visa to Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, who has been invited to attend a conference in New Jersey this August celebrating Gujarati culture."
Neera Tanden, 38, one of Senator Hillary Clinton's closest aides and confidantes, has joined the campaign of Democratic presidential nominee Senator Barack Obama and will relocate to the campaign headquarters in Chicago this week. Sources told rediff.com that unlike Clinton's former campaign manager Patti Solis Doyle, who was pushed out of the campaign and then jumped on the Obama campaign bandwagon, Clinton backed Tanden's decision to join the Democratic presidential nominee
Sant Chatwal, millionaire hotelier and close friend and fund-raiser for the Clintons for several years, has assured Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama that the Indian American community will raise over $10 million for his campaign to win back the White House.Chatwal was introduced to Obama by Senator Hillary Clinton at a private meeting between them and Clinton's top donors at the Mayflower Hotel in Washington, DC on June 26.
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