M A I N   N E W S

Clinton’s trip ‘unconditional’

WASHINGTON, Feb 11 (PTI, UNI) — US President Bill Clinton’s forthcoming visit to India has “absolutely no conditions” attached to it and would focus on the new Indo-American relationship without any links to matters such as nuclear proliferation, the comprehensive test ban treaty or Kashmir.

“There are absolutely no conditions” attached to President Clinton’s visit to India, Foreign Secretary Lalit Mansingh told reporters here yesterday after intensive two-day talks with US officials involved in setting the Presidential agenda for the trip and key senators and Congressmen.

On the current debate on whether Mr Clinton should visit Pakistan or not, he said, “This is a sovereign decision to be taken by the American side but as a friend, India has told the USA that there will be a public reaction at home if Mr Clinton decides to go to Pakistan as well.

“As friends, we thought we should bring to their notice that there will be a public reaction (in India if Mr Clinton decides to go to Pakistan), and this has been conveyed to them,” Mr Mansingh, who is here to lay the ground for Mr Clinton’s visit to India in March, said.

The focus of the visit, said Mr Mansingh, would be on the new post-cold war relationship, the new friendship, partnership being forged between the world’s most powerful democracy and the world’s largest democracy. This new partnership and matters of mutual interest would cover, among other things, political, economic relationships, cooperation in science and technology, and energy cooperation.

“We are not looking for any favours,” he said.

When his attention was drawn to US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright’s recent statements concerning Kashmir and cautioning against expectations that all outstanding problems between India and the USA would be resolved during the visit, Mr Mansingh said: “This is a meeting of democracies. In democracy, we discuss differences but discuss them in a friendly manner.

Meanwhile, Ms Madeleine Albright has urged Russia to work with the USA in bringing India and Pakistan “back from the nuclear precipice” and making them sign the CTBT as they both (USA and Russia) have “powerful reasons” and “interest” to attain these goals.

“We both have an interest in walking India and Pakistan back from the nuclear precipice, and in reinforcing global norms that were challenged by those countries’ nuclear blasts,” she said in a speech at the Diplomatic Academy in Moscow on February 2, which was released here yesterday.

Continuing her crusade to rope in India and Pakistan into the CTBT and impose USA’s ideas on nuclear issues, she said: “We both have an interest in bringing the CTBT (rejected by the US Senate) into force, and in maintaining our respective moratoria on testing until we do.”