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| US steps up efforts to bring India in loop | | | ABID SHAH
early times report
NEW DELHI, July 20: With today's interaction between US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Indian External Affairs Minister SM Krishna on the sidelines of Kabul conference of over 70 countries a deeper interaction between India and US appears to have begun.
This is indicated by the announcement of US President's advisor on Afghanistan and Pakistan Richard Holbrooke's visit tomorrow to New Delhi which is to be soon followed up by the arrival in Delhi of top US commander Admiral Mike Mullen.
Both US dignitaries are going to have a busy schedule in the Capital where they are likely to meet top Indian officials. Among other things these visits signify an imminent American withdrawal from Afghanistan where US would like India to play its role as an important country of the region. And to pave way for this the US also wants tension between India and Pakistan to be reduced.
A process for this has already been initiated by the Secretary of State as Clinton has said that she briefed Pakistan about disclosures made by David Headley after his arrest. This assertion by her is significant since Pakistan has been making noises after Indian officials pointed to Headley's interrogation by Indian officials in US for his role in 26/11 attack on Mumbai where he had revealed of ISI's backing given to the attackers.
Hillary has been having long interaction with Pakistani officials mainly Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi and his Ministry's officials where Pakistan has been insisting that US to make India to relent and discuss Kashmir instead of confining negotiations to terror. Though Clinton has mentioned Kashmir at a joint Press conference with Qureshi she declined to play any direct role in taking this up with India.
Yet, today's development in Kabul point to increased US diplomacy in South Asia which aims at taking back US troops from Afghanistan in phased manner as per an earlier plan from July next year.
Today at the Kabul conference it was announced that all foreign troops would be out of Afghanistan by 2014 and Kabul would start looking after its own affairs, including security.
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