Tag: Nirmala Sitharaman

India-US strategic 2+2 dialogue to be held in Delhi on September 6

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Foreign and defence ministers of India and the US will hold the first edition of the “2+2” strategic dialogue on security and defense ties in Delhi on September 6, it was announced on Friday.

“Minister of External Affairs Sushma Swaraj and Raksha Mantri (Defence Minister) Nirmala Sitharaman will host the US Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo and US Secretary of Defence James Mattis, in New Delhi on September 6, 2018, for the inaugural 2+2 dialogue,” External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said.

“This new dialogue format is in pursuit of agreement reached between India and the US during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Washington D.C. on June 25-26, 2017,” Kumar said.

“The 2+2 meeting will cover a broad range of bilateral, regional and global issues of shared interest, with a view to strengthening strategic and security ties between the two countries,” he added.

The twice deferred meeting was earlier scheduled to take place in Washington on July 6. But it had to be put off purportedly because US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was to travel to North Korea for unscheduled meetings with officials of that country.

The first “2+2” meeting was to take place in April. That was also to be hosted by the US but was called off after President Donald Trump suddenly sacked then Secretary of State Rex Tillerson.

Also announcing the new date and venue, the US State Department said: “The inaugural US-India 2+2 Dialogue will be held in New Delhi on September 6.”

It said the two sides will meet “to discuss strengthening strategic, security, and defence cooperation as the US and India jointly address challenges in the Indo-Pacific region and beyond”.

US Ambassador in New Delhi Ken Juster said the US “look(s) forward to productive discussions between our two countries on ways to strengthen US-India strategic, security, and defense cooperation”.

The “2+2” dialogue for strategic level talks was agreed between the two sides during Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s June 2017 US trip. The new format replaces the Strategic and Commercial Dialogue between the foreign and commerce ministers of the two countries held during the Obama administration.

The sudden decision to call off the talks in July triggered speculation that it signalled a lower priority the Trump administration was according to the ties with India.

It was also said that the US may not have been happy with India going ahead with its plan to buy military equipment from Russia despite American sanctions targeting Moscow under the Countering America s Adversaries through Sanctions Act (CAATSA).

Sources in New Delhi said the two sides in their September 6 meetings will seek finalisation of key defence agreements like the Communications, Compatibility, Security Agreement (COMCASA) — a defence foundational pact that will enable India to obtain critical, secure and encrypted defence technologies from other countries.

The sources said Indian and the US ministers would also discuss developments and issues of mutual interest in Afghanistan, Pakistan and Iran. Russia and China are also expected to come up during the talks.

They said India would seek waiver from the CAATSA that can hit Indian military purchases from Russia and also the import of crude oil from Iran which has also been sanctioned.

The US sanctions against Russian oligarchs and companies have threatened India’s proposed purchase of five regiments of Russian-made S-400 Triumf advanced air defense system, a $5.5 billion military deal almost ready to be signed for a closure.

The US has said the CAATSA also prohibits American allies from dealing with sanctioned individuals and companies of Russia, and if New Delhi went ahead with its new military purchases, it would complicate “our ability to work out inter-operability”.

India’s deep military and strategic ties with Russia date back to the beginning of the Cold War even as New Delhi led a movement of “non-aligned” countries that declared their tilt with neither Washington nor Moscow. However, India always leaned toward the then USSR.

India still buys over 60 per cent of its defence equipment from Russia. At present, the Indian armed forces are 70 per cent equipped with Soviet or Russian weapons.

Defence Minister Sitharaman last week said the CAATSA, essentially a US law, was not binding on India and would therefore not affect India’s foreign policy and strategic decisions with other countries.

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S-400 missile deal with Russia to go ahead despite US sanctions, says Nirmala Sitharaman

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman today said the S-400 Triumf air defence missile deal with Russia will go ahead notwithstanding the US sanctions on military transactions with Moscow.Nirmala Sitharaman

Referring to CAATSA (Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act), under which the Trump administration has imposed sanctions on military deals with Russia, she said it is an American law and not a UN law and India has conveyed its position on the issue to the US.

“Our defence relation with Russia has endured several decades and we have conveyed about it to a US Congressional delegation which visited India recently,” Sitharaman told a group of reporters at her office in South Block.

She said negotiations with Russia for the S-400 missile deal have almost come to conclusion.

The defence minister said it may take two-and-a-half to four years to implement the S-400 missile deal after it is signed.

There has been mounting concerns in India over the US sanctions against Russian defence majors including Rosoboronexport as billions of dollars of military purchases may be impacted because of the punitive measure.

The US had announced sanctions against Russia under the stringent law for its alleged meddling in the American presidential election in 2016.

CAATSA mandates the Donald Trump administration to punish entities engaging in significant transaction with the defence or intelligence establishment of Russia.

India wants to procure the long-range missile systems to tighten its air defence mechanism, particularly along the nearly 4,000-km-long Sino-India border.

In 2016, India and Russia had signed an agreement on the ‘Triumf’ interceptor-based missile system which can destroy incoming hostile aircraft, missiles and even drones at ranges of up to 400 km. S-400 is known as Russia’s most advanced long-range surface-to-air missile defence system.

China was the first foreign buyer to seal a government-to-government deal with Russia in 2014 to procure the lethal missile system and Moscow has already started delivery of unknown number of the S-400 missile systems to Beijing.

The S-400 is an upgraded version of the S-300 systems. The missile system, manufactured by Almaz-Antey, has been in service in Russia since 2007.

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India says twice-delayed strategic talks with US to be held in September

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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India will hold a top-level strategic dialogue with the United States in the first week of September, defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Friday, after the United States last month postponed the meeting for a second time this year.

So-called two-plus-two talks were agreed by US President Donald Trump and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi last year.

The United States postponed the talks twice but later said it was a priority.

“The 2+2 dialogue with the US is to happen in the first week of September,” defence minister Nirmala Sitharaman told the television news agency ANI, a Reuters affiliate.

“The agenda will be to develop and strengthen strategic defence cooperation.”

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Defense Secretary Jim Mattis had been scheduled to hold joint talks with their Indian counterparts in Washington on July 6.

But Pompeo postponed the meeting because of “unavoidable reasons”, the Indian foreign ministry said last month.

The meeting was originally planned for April but had to be put off because Trump fired Secretary of State Rex Tillerson the previous month and Pompeo went through confirmation hearings before the US Congress.

Separately, the Times of India daily reported on Friday that India has invited Trump to be the chief guest at January’s Republic Day parade.

India‘s foreign ministry did not immediately respond to an email request for comment.

Trump and Modi took great pains to stress the importance of a strong US-Indian relationship when they met in Washington a year ago.

But trade differences between their countries have increased in recent months. In June, India raised duties on US farm products in retaliation for Trump’s tariff increases on steel and aluminium.

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Sushma Swaraj and Nirmala Sitharaman to visit Washington for strategic 2+2 Dialogue

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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India’s External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman will hold the first strategic 2+2 Dialogue with their US counterparts on July 6 in Washington, the State Department announced on Thursday.

Secretary of State Michael R. Pompeo and Secretary of Defense James Mattis will host the Indian ministers at the meeting that “will focus on strengthening strategic, security, and defence cooperation as the United States and India jointly confront global challenges”, the Department said.

In New Delhi, the External Affairs Ministry said that Sushma Swaraj and Sitharaman will visit the US for the first meeting of the ‘2+2 Dialogue’ on July 6, where “the two sides are expected to shares perspectives on strengthening their strategic and security ties and exchange views on a range of bilateral, regional and global issues of mutual interest”.

Minister of State for External Affairs V.K. Singh and US Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan discussed the agenda for the 2+2 Ministerial Dialogue, which was announced during Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s meeting with President Donald Trump last June, on the sidelines of the G20 Ministerial Meeting in Buenos Aires last month, it said.

The meeting was to have been held in April, but was postponed because of changes in the leadership of the State Department after Rex Tillerson resigned and Pompeo was in the process of taking over.

The optics of the Dialogue will break some stereotypes: Two powerful women from India will be sitting across from two men representing the US.

The dialogue is a centrepiece of the growing ties between the US and India which Washington wants to scale up by extending the strategic vision from the Pacific to the Indian Ocean.

Outlining the new approach, Tillerson said last year that India and US were “two bookends of stability on either side of the globe”.

“We need to collaborate with India to ensure that the Indo-Pacific is increasingly a place of peace, stability, and growing prosperity – so that it does not become a region of disorder, conflict and predatory economics,” he said in a reference to China’s role in the region.

Washington approach also meshes with Modi’s “Act East” policy of building on India’s relations with countries to the east.

An informal quadrilateral system with the Indo-Pacific region’s major democracies, India, the US, Japan and Australia, is also developing.

While the Dialogue is focused on strategic and defence issues, there has been signs of stress in the trade and services sectors.

Tightening of rules on visas for Indian professionals and possibility of increasing tariffs on Indian exports are matters of concern for India, but are not directly on the agenda at the talks.

Besides China and the developments in East and Southeast Asia, other strategic issues of concern — and divergence in some cases — are Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.

Trump has asked for India’s help in bringing stability to Afghanistan through aid programmes, but by reimposing sanctions on Iran he has threatened those very efforts.

In dealing with the strategic relations, the four officials will have to consider India’s reluctance to wholeheartedly embrace a deep alliance with the US or a bloc overtly opposed to China.

Modi has recently turned his attention to improve relations with China and Russia.

He met China’s President Xi Jinping in Wuhan in April and Russia’s President Vladimir Putin last month.

Meanwhile in East Asia, Trump’s historic meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has also introduced new factors in the region.

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KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow

Indigenisation in defence sector has to be on top of agenda, says Nirmala Sitharaman

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman today said manufacturing of defence equipment cannot be done with borrowed technology and indigenisation has to be on top of the agenda for India, which is one of the largest importers of arms in the world.

“India being the largest procurer of defence equipment, the emphasis on indigenisation has to be reiterated. This is exactly what has happened from 2014,” she said, referring to the government’s Make in India initiative.

“Manufacturing of defence equipment by keeping indigenisation as its top consideration has to be on top of the agenda. Manufacturing cannot be done with borrowed technology. We really got to have the drive for innovation,” Sitharaman said, addressing Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) scientists at an event here.

S Christopher, Chairman of the DRDO, said the organisation has now got an engine for Ghatak, an unmanned combat air vehicle, and is working to have DRDO sensors and weapons on the warships that are exported.

This month also marks the 20th anniversary of the 1998 Pokhran nuclear tests.

Lauding the DRDO scientists for conducting the Pokhran tests successfully, Sitharaman said they were carried out under “global watch” and restricted conditions, yet the world did not get a hint about the tests.

“There was a sense of commitment when we achieved it in such a quiet fashion,” she said.

Following the Pokhran tests, the West, led by the US, had imposed sanctions on India.

Several DRDO scientists were also awarded on the occasion. Niti Aayog member and former scientific advisor to defence minister V K Saraswat was honoured with the Lifetime Achievement Award.

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Sitharaman, Adityanath discuss Bundelkhand defence corridor

KV Prasad Jun 13, 2022, 06:35 AM IST (Published)

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Defence Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath on Monday held detailed discussions on the proposed Rs 20,000 crore defence corridor in Bundelkhand region and said that much headway had been made since its announcement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi at the Investors Summit in Lucknow in February.

Sitharaman said that the blueprint of the ambitious project was made in just 20 days and asserted that once it becomes a reality, the entire impoverished Bundelkhand region will see unprecedented economic development and more jobs being created.

This will be the second defence corridor, after Chennai, where defence products will be manufactured, she added.

Sitharaman also said that she will hold stock-taking meetings about the progress in the project every week and even Modi was personally supervising the project.

The minister also said that the corridor will be a big boon for small entrepreneurs.

Union Minister Uma Bharati, who is the Jhansi MP, said that the defence corridor will be a game changer for the Bundelkhand region, while Adityanath assured all support and cooperation to the Central Government for realizing this project on ground.

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KV Prasad Journo follow politics, process in Parliament and US Congress. Former Congressional APSA-Fulbright Fellow