19 January 2009
Obama Aims to Partner with South Asia on Critical Issues
Key areas of cooperation include counterterrorism, trade, climate change
Washington — Since Barack Obama first made campaign promises to build economic and security relationships in South Asia, global economic and security crises have intensified.
The president-elect has refrained from public policy statements since his election as the 44th U.S. president in deference to the departing Bush administration, but Obama’s chief advisers have indicated India and its neighbors are important economic, security and development partners.
“We will build on our economic and political partnership with India, the world’s most populous democracy and a nation with growing influence in the world,” Secretary of State–designate Hillary Clinton said at her confirmation hearing before a Senate committee January 13.
Based on statements made during his campaign, Obama recognizes India as South Asia’s economic powerhouse, and also knows many Indian Americans are active politically and retain strong personal and business ties to India.
Job outsourcing in grim economic times is a sensitive domestic issue, and Obama has said he wants to find a middle way that balances the reality of global markets with the needs of American workers.
He also has said he supports comprehensive immigration reform and improvement in the H-1B visa program to attract talented people to the United States.
“We know that emerging markets like China, India, Brazil, South Africa and Indonesia are feeling the effects of the current [economic] crisis. We all stand to benefit in both the short and long term if they are part of the solution," Clinton said in her January 13 testimony, emphasizing interdependency of nations in addressing the toughest problems, including climate change and terrorism.
TERRORISM A MUTUAL CONCERN
Clinton said the incoming administration is committed to using “diplomacy, development, and defense — to work with those in Afghanistan and Pakistan who want to root out al-Qaida, the Taliban and other violent extremists.”
The recent visit of Vice President-elect Joe Biden to Pakistan and Afghanistan underscored those concerns, which also were voiced by Obama following the November 2008 terrorist attacks in Mumbai.
In a statement issued through his transition team, Obama condemned the attacks: “The United States must continue to strengthen our partnerships with India and nations around the world to root out and destroy terrorist networks. We stand with the people of India, whose democracy will prove far more resilient than the hateful ideology that led to these attacks."
Obama favors greater security cooperation with India, Pakistan and Afghanistan. He has called Pakistan and Afghanistan “the central front in the fight against terrorism,” Clinton told Congress. “We need to deepen our engagement with these and other countries in the region and pursue policies that improve the lives of the Afghan and Pakistani people,” she said.
Both India and the United States have been victims of terrorist attacks and there is a shared interest in counterterrorism, Obama has said. He also encouraged India-Pakistan dialogue on Kashmir.
NUCLEAR SECURITY
The United States and India now may cooperate in civil nuclear research and development as well as commercial trade in nuclear reactors, technology and fuel. This follows the enactment of the United States-India Nuclear Cooperation Approval and Non-proliferation Enhancement Act October 8, 2008, a measure Obama supported. That law was the last step in a diplomatic process that began July 18, 2005, when President Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh announced the U.S.-India Civil Nuclear Cooperation Initiative.
“The deal is important, but by itself it doesn’t transform the relationship. It’s a major step in that direction,” senior fellow at Brookings Institution and South Asia specialist Stephen P. Cohen told America.gov “The future of the relationship will depend largely on internal Indian development and reform of the relationship with Pakistan.”
Obama wants stronger nuclear nonproliferation mechanisms and U.S. ratification of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty with a goal to “secure loose nuclear materials from terrorists” within four years.
CLIMATE CHANGE
Obama sees an opportunity for jobs in renewable energy and green technology industries as part of the imperative to address global warming. An Obama campaign proposal called for creation of a “Global Energy Forum — based on the G8+5, which includes all G8 members plus Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa.” This forum would include the nations, both developed and developing, that consume the most energy and would focus exclusively on global energy and environmental issues.
“The world is in need of an urgent, coordinated response to climate change and as President-elect Obama has said, America must be a leader in developing and implementing it," Clinton said. "At the extreme, it threatens our very existence, but well before that point, it could very well incite new wars of an old kind — over basic resources like food, water and arable land," she said.
Several South Asian Americans serve on Obama’s transition team, including Google.org’s Sonal Shah, who helps direct his Committee on Technology, Innovation and Government Reform.
