The visit, Kim's third since March, is taking place amid sharp escalation rhetoric between Beijing and Washington over tariffs almost spiralling into a trade war.
United States President Obama will host Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in a mini bilateral summit before the start of the Nuclear Security Summit in Washington beginning April 12, instead of the brief meeting originally slated on the margins of the parley, claim sources. The report about the possible meeting comes amidst growing concern in both the US and New Delhi that the Obama administration has been ignoring India.
United States President Barack Obama has assured Pakistan Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani that Washington has no plans to control Islamabad's nuclear programme.
The trilateral AUKUS security alliance complements partnerships like Quad and there was a "very warm embrace" of the deal by India and Japan as both the countries totally understood and supported what it is seeking to achieve, Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Thursday.
In the backdrop of fears about terrorists gaining access to nuclear material, leaders from 47 countries, including Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, on Monday assembled in Washington to discuss ways to ensure that such a scenario was averted. At the two-day summit, which is an initiative of United States President Barack Obama, India is expected to voice its concern over the safety of Pakistan's atomic arsenal.
The prime ministers of India and Pakistan may have 'a brief encounter' in Washington on the sidelines of the April 12-13 Nuclear Security Summit, though proper talks between them are more likely during a South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation meet in Bhutan in April, a media report said on Saturday. The United States administration would prefer to arrange a proper meeting between the two prime ministers on the margins of the nuclear summit next week.
Soon after his keynote address at the US-India Aviation Partnership Summit at the Washington Convention Center in Washington DC, Nambiar told rediff.com, although India's airlines were bleeding currently, they would bounce back because of domestic and international travel demands.
As one surveys the changing face of mulilateralsim today, we see mutation and multiplication. The underlying reality is that the world is multipolar and with more poles, you tend to get more constellations.
"President Trump believes that Kim has an unprecedented opportunity to change the trajectory of our relationship and bring peace and prosperity to his country," Pompeo said.
The event is the third meeting between the two leaders in three months, after the G-20 summit in Japan in June and the G-7 summit in France last month.
'You'll see during the course of this visit, we'll have some important deliverables to announce in the area of energy and climate change,' US Assistant Secretary of State Robert O Blake on the prime minister's journey to Washington, DC next week.
Supninder Singh Khehra, an Indian citizen from Patiala and a resident of the Toronto suburb of Brampton, was verbally abused and beaten by a group of men who seemed to be drunk.
Atmar briefed Jaishankar about the situation in the war-torn country amid growing security concerns over the Taliban fighters rapidly seizing control of a large number of areas, forcing many countries to scale down their presence there.
Besides firming up India-EU counter-terror partnership, the Summit in Brussels is expected to evince interest in other projects like cleaning of Ganga on the lines of River Rhine and Danube.
Biden has reiterated America's support for India's permanent membership on a reformed UNSC and its entry into the NSG during his first in-person bilateral meeting with Modi at the White House.
This visit has ended on a vastly different note in comparison with Modi's previous visits. Call it a rebuke, call it a censure, call it a distancing from Modi, the sharp message would have gone home, observes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
'Countries in possession of nuclear weapons have a heightened sense of power and it is logical for Kim to expect/demand to be treated as an equal at any bargaining table.' 'It is here that Trump ought to respect Kim as the leader of a sovereign power and not treat the North Korean leader as a subordinate,' says Dr Rajaram Panda.
'When the issue of terrorism came up, the Vice President suo moto referred Pakistan's role in that regard (of terrorism),' Foreign Secretary Harsh Vardhan Shringla told reporters when asked if the issue of Pakistan's role in terrorism came up during her meeting with Modi.
'From the Indian perspective, Trump's invitation to Imran Khan to visit the White House is a bitter pill to swallow,' points out Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
The Finance Minister said as a result of India's economic reforms, a number of Indian companies have grown in size and stature and at times tend to compete with the US companies.
Sharma said both US President Barack Obama and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh are firmly committed to take this relationship to greater heights.
'India's relationship with China has been and will continue to be complex, delicate and sensitive,' says Rup Narayan Das.
'The US President is joining the Prime Minister in addressing a huge Indian diaspora event in Houston and they will also meet on the margins of the UNGA in New York'
Rediff.com brings for you some behind-the-scenes moments from the G-20 summit
Google's Indian-American CEO Sundar Pichai has predicted that India and England would clash in the finals of the ICC Cricket World Cup 2019 and said he was 'rooting' for the men in blue to emerge victorious.
'Washington senses that the anchor sheet of India's strategic autonomy lies in its longstanding partnership with Russia, which remains firm and immutable despite the changes in world politics in the post-Cold War era,' notes Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.<
Welcoming "peaceful rise" of China as a world power, United States President Barack Obama Friday greeted his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping at Palm Springs in California for a two day summit, with both leaders calling for a new approach to ties between Washington and Beijing.
External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and her American counterpart Mike Pompeo have agreed to reschedule the postponed '2+2 dialogue'.
India, the world's third biggest oil consumer, meets more than 80 per cent of its oil needs through imports.
'Any future course of action towards active participation in the alliance when formed would need a lot of deliberation, long term vision and should be in our best national interests,' notes Commodore Vengalil Venugopal (retd).
Describing India's non-proliferation record as "solid", the United States has asked all nuclear-capable states to exercise restraint regarding their atomic capabilities.
Modi hits out at trade protectionism and calls for a rule-based, transparent, anti-discriminatory, open and all inclusive WTO-centred multilateral trading system focused so that the interests of every country specially the developing ones can be taken care of.
Trump also said in a separate tweet that North Korea is 'no longer' the US' 'biggest and most dangerous problem', telling Americans and the rest of the world they can 'sleep well tonight!'
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Wednesday left for Brussels for the first leg of his three nation tour of Belgium, United States and Saudi Arabia.
There has been no evidence that Pakistan leadership knew of the presence of Osama bin Laden inside their country, a top Pentagon commander has said citing post-raid analysis of the secret operation that killed the most wanted terrorist of the world.
The White House has said the forthcoming book by John Bolton is "full of classified information"
'One lesson to emerge out of the Modi-Putin summit is that India can be more self-confident that it possesses inherent strengths to leverage its interlocutors to influence Pakistani policies,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
More than India's alignment with the Quad, India's defence cooperation and partnership with the USA is of critical importance, notes Rup Narayan Das.
Any Indian government at this juncture would have voted and spoken exactly this way. It isn't just about the vast Indian dependence on Russian-origin military equipment. It is also about trust, asserts Shekhar Gupta.
It is time for the US to reposition its foreign policy.
