India has apparently put in a request to import oil and gas from the US, and if there is a long-term understanding on this in New Delhi during John Kerry's visit to India, it may well be the next big thing in bilateral relations. It will transform global politics beyond recognition and usher in a new architecture in India-US relations, says TP Sreenivasan
The government of India in welcoming the new United States ambassador to India, erstwhile India and South Asia hand, Nancy J Powell, has said that while India would not be new to her, it would not be the same either, considering the transformational changes India has undergone.
If confirmed, Nancy Powell will be the first woman ambassador to India, but some have questioned if she would have the ear of the President unlike a political appointee. Aziz Haniffa reports from Washington DC.
On the eve of US President Barack Obama's visit to India next month, a new report has urged, as a top priority, that the US unambiguously and unequivocally endorse New Delhi's bid for a permanent seat in the United Nations.
Pakistan on Monday formally asked India to provide further information and clarifications regarding the Mumbai attacks to enable its authorities to "proceed further" in their investigation into the terrorist assault that killed nearly 180 people.
''There is the perennial worry in the Indian mind regarding the US 'hyphenating' India and Pakistan. Frankly, this is a completely nonsensical hypothesis. The US has always 'hyphenated' India and Pakistan and it couldn't have been otherwise,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
United States President Barack Obama has nominated Nisha Desai Biswal as the new assistant secretary of state for south and central Asian affairs.
On Thursday, November 6, the Washington Post newspaper reported that controversial American diplomat, Ambassador Robin Raphel, had her office and home searched by the FBI. This most unusual development likely raised much cheer at India's ministry of external affairs, in whose flesh Raphel had been a thorn through much of her tenure in the first Bill Clinton administration in the early and mid-1990s by her anti-India and pro-Pakistan stand. Seventeen years ago, as she was about to step down as Assistant Secretary of State for South Asian Affairs, Raphel granted an exclusive interview to Aziz Haniffa and India Abroad, the leading Indian-American weekly newspaper, which is now owned by Rediff.com The July 1997 interview, which provoked a raging controversy in both capitals, Washington, DC and New Delhi, is reproduced here...
Retired senior US diplomats Teresita and Howard Schaffer believe the 'US cannot afford to continue restricting its contacts with Narendra Modi.' Rediff.com's Aziz Haniffa reports from Washington, DC.
'The US-India relationship is in a different league altogether,' Obama administration officials tell Aziz Haniffa/Rediff.com in Washington, DC.
Two former senior United States diplomats, with more than 60 years experience in South Asia between them, have exhorted Washington to establish communication with Bharatiya Janata Party's prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi sooner than later.
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