Officials of the US State Department have been briefing the media about the kind of honours that will be accorded to Dr Singh when he visits Washington. These are meant to show that there has been no change in US policies towards India under the Obama administration. The reality is that on every matter, which is of concern to India, greater attention is being paid to China's sensitivities and concerns.
Noting that it would be difficult to win the war in Afghanistan without destroying "safe haven" of Taliban militants inside neighbouring Pakistan, the United States said on Monday that it would now focus on how to tackle the situation. "Obviously, this was an area that's just along the border. If there isn't a safe haven in Pakistan, it's harder for any attacks to come. And I think that's certainly part of the focus," White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said.
Accusing Sri Lankan President Mahinda Rajapakse of abdicating his responsibility to save civilians in the restive north, Tamil Americans have asked United States President Barack Obama to send his forces to the strife-torn nation to save the lives of innocent people. "This is pure and simple genocide. We are asking the Obama administration to intervene to save the Tamils of Sri Lanka by sending its army there," they said.
Obama Administration's top diplomat for Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke, who has already visited New Delhi twice to brief Indian leaders of President Obama's AfPak strategy, on Tuesday said that due to elections India had not gotten fully engaged in the regional approach that is an integral part of the US strategy.
But at the same time before leaving for Presidential Day recess, the Senate has not cleared the names of at least a dozen Obama nominees. Obama warned that if the Senate does not approve/confirm his nominees, who are critical to run his administration, he reserves the right to use his recess appointment authority in the future.
The Barack Obama administration has asserted its commitment towards implementing the India-United States civilian nuclear agreement, a landmark foreign policy achievement by the previous George W Bush government. The US Department of Energy on Thursday issued a statement, following the conclusion of a three-day meeting of the 'US-India Civil Nuclear Energy Working Group'.
The Obama Administration is awaiting the advent of the new government in India to engage New Delhi on the final implementation details of the US-India civilian nuclear deal, the Acting point person for South Asia at the US Department of State has said.
It is not all hosannahs for India in the report, however. Terming it as a 'complicated rise', the report says over the next 15-20 years Indian leaders will strive for a multi-polar international system, with New Delhi as one of the poles, and serving as a political and cultural bridge between a rising China and the US
The United States is reportedly set to abandon its plans for a missile defense system in Poland and the Czech Republic following a review of Iran's long-range missile program which has not shown the progress that the US was expecting from it.
Slamming the US President for talking too much, Indian-American Governor Bobby Jindal has said the policies of the Obama administration will send more jobs to countries like India and China.
US President Barack Obama has unveiled a $13 billion plan to develop a nationwide high speed rail network, which he argued "will be faster, cheaper and easier than building more freeways or adding to an already overburdened aviation system".
When asked about recent rhetoric from top Republican leaders including the former Vice President, Dick Cheney, who in a CNN interview had alleged that Obama is making US unsafe, Jindal said: 'Democrat or Republican, we should all agree that our current President and our former President would obviously want to do everything they could to keep us safe. I don't think we should question President Obama's patriotism or his intentions.'
Implying that Mumbai could be considered as a turning point in such terrorist tactics, Leiter said: 'We have seen, since the attacks in Mumbai, a desire and willingness to change some of these tactics, and we are concerned about the change of these tactics, both in the Pakistan-Afghanistan-Indian region, but also beyond that, and the potential for that to manifest itself in the United States or elsewhere.'
The United States encourages open exchange between China and the Dalai Lama on the issue of Tibet, an Obama Administration official said today.
Bringing cheers to more than 1.5 million Cuban-Americans, the Obama Administration said on Monday it has lifted all restrictions related to the travel of family members to Cuba and removed restrictions on remittances to their family members in the island.
'Not only will Pakistan see greater domestic turmoil as a result of the passage of this law, but the new regulation will further aggravate tensions between Islamabad and Washington, complicating Western efforts to combat the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan,' Stratfor said.
For two decades the US paid in blood and blood money for dependence on Pakistan to carry out one president's boast. Now, having been defeated by its proxies, another president will go into Rawalpindi's embrace to satisfy his constituents, predicts Shekhar Gupta.
The visit of US Defence Secretary Robert Gates to New Delhi - the first by a top Obama administration member after the State Visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh here last year - is all set to bolster Indo-US ties, a leading American expert on South Asia has said.
In the first-ever indication of its stand on H-1B visas popular among Indian professionals, the Obama Administration has informed a court that the US needs this scheme to avoid "competitive disadvantage" the American companies could face otherwise.
As the Barack Obama administration proposes to pump billions of dollars into Pakistan, United States' Congressmen have insisted that Islamabad must be made accountable in lieu of the massive aid. Grilling top army and defense officials, members of the powerful House Armed Services Committee wanted to know from the officials, testifying before it, that the administration has a mechanism to ensure that more than $10 billion being given to Pakistan is not wasted.
Close on the heels of the Barack Obama administration approving reconciliation efforts with the moderate elements of the Taliban in Afghanistan, the United States has categorically ruled out any similar settlement with the al Qaeda. "We have no interest in any kind of reconciliation or any rapprochement by anyone with al Qaeda," US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said. "Only the Taliban, we never said al Qaeda," she said.
Citing assaults from hackers on its computer systems and China's attempts to 'limit free speech on the Web', Google in a statement said on Tuesday it would stop cooperating with Chinese Internet censorship and consider shutting down its operations in China.
Amidst reports that North Korea has invited top American diplomats to Pyongyang for a bilateral dialogue, the United States has asserted that there is no such plan for its officials to travel to the country. The Barack Obama administration also reiterated its condition for having any bilateral dialogue with North Korea within the framework of six-party talks.
The Obama administration has said that North Korea should give up its ambition of becoming a nuclear power before returning to the denuclearisation talks.
In a recently released report, the Obama administration's advisory group on Science and Technology has said that the H1N1 flu virus, dubbed 'Swine flu,' could cause as many as 30,000 to 90,000 deaths in the United States and pose a serious health threat.
Obama administration wants to force a wide range of large financial institutions to hold more capital as part of a sweeping regulatory overhaul
"Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula is an extension of Al Qaeda core coming out of Pakistan. And, in my view, it is one of the most lethal and one of the most concerning of it," John Brennan, assistant to the US President for Counterterrorism and Homeland Security, told media persons at a White House briefing.
Such a partnership between the two countries, after the civilian nuclear deal, is essential to jointly meet the challenges of climate change, prime minister's special envoy on climate change Shyam Saran told a meeting of US corporate leaders organised by the US India Business Council. USIBC had played a significant role in the passage of the Indo-US civilian nuclear deal, despite tough hurdles.
The deal between President Asif Ali Zardari and Opposition leader Nawaz Sharif does not herald a solution to the instability of the nuclear-armed Pakistan nor does it ensure the Obama administration's primary objective of tamping down the Taliban insurgency, a media report said today.
United States has begun preparations to accord a "robust" welcome to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in November, the first state visit of the Obama administration, to make it a special visit for the Indian leader and a "milestone" event in the Indo-US relationship.
The United States has adopted a "completely new approach" in Afghanistan and Pakistan, a top Obama Administration official has said, stressing al Qaeda will be denied a safe haven in the region.
Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon, who wrapped up three days of intensive discussions with the hierarchy of the new Obama administration at the State Department, White House, and Pentagon, and also met with the leadership in the US Congress, apparently has every reason to be satisfied that the transformed US-India relationship is ready to be launched to the next level of the partnership.
The Obama administration has shelved the idea of launching a massive military evacuation of nearly 200,000 Tamil civilians trapped in the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam strongholds, sources have told Rediff India Abroad.
The new Obama Administration on Wednesday assured India that it will proceed with the landmark Indo-US nuclear deal, signed during George W Bush's tenure, and said the two countries needed to ramp up cooperation in counter-terrorism and global issues such as climate change.
On the eve of the first high-level talks between India and the new Obama Administration in Washington, with the arrival of Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon, who will meet with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and other senior US officials later today (Monday), outgoing Ambassador Ronen Sen has dismissed concerns over the momentum of the relationship under the new dispensation in DC.
Ron Somers, president of the US-India Business Council, has said that the top priority on his organisation's wish list for the Obama Administration is that "we are intent on seeing a bilateral investment treaty executed between our countries."
"During the Sharm el-Sheik conference, I emphasised President Obama's and my commitment to working to achieve a two-state solution to the conflict between Israel and the Palestinians," Clinton said who is on her first visit to the region in the capacity of Secretary of State.
David C Mulford, who will soon vacate his post as United States'ambassador to India, has urged the Obama administration to ensure the implementation of the India-US civilian nuclear agreement.In an interaction at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, Mulford said, "The nuclear deal may be completed, but the work isn't done. There is unfinished business there to be done."
The important criterion that you will have to meet for this is that you have to be an investor in the American economy.
"We are troubled and confused in the sense about what happened in Swat, because it is not an encouraging trend," Richard Holbrooke, the Special US Representative for Pakistan and Afghanistan told the PBS news channel in an interview.
