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Last updated: June 24, 2023 at 00:55 IST
Washington DC, USA (USA)
Kirby stressed that Prime Minister Modi’s visit was meant to send a message to the American and Indian people about how important this bilateral relationship is to people around the world.
John Kirby, a spokesman for the US National Security Council, said that the relationship between Washington and New Delhi has its own advantages
A senior White House official stressed on Friday that the United States does not view India as a counterbalance to China, emphasizing that Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s state visit is not centered around Beijing.
John Kirby, a spokesman for the US National Security Council, said that the relationship between Washington and New Delhi is based on its merits and concerns the Indian and American peoples.
PM Modi highlights US: PM raises a toast to India-US friendship at state lunch, to end his visit with an address to the Indian diaspora today
While acknowledging the challenges India faces with China, Kirby emphasized that India deals with them independently.
The state visit (of Prime Minister Modi) was not about China. India has challenges with China as well right on their doorstep and more widely in their region. The challenges presented by the People’s Republic of China to both of our countries were clearly on the agenda yesterday. But this was not about taking advantage of India as a kind of counterweight. “India is an independent, sovereign country,” John Kirby said during a press conference.
video | This state visit was not about China because India is an independent sovereign country and they have their own foreign policy that they have to manage. “They live in a tough neighborhood,” says White House official John Kirby on Prime Minister Modi’s state visit to the US.#PMModiUSVisit pic.twitter.com/Lwfiv4vy9A– Press Trust of India (PTI_News) June 23, 2023
Asked about India’s role in relation to Washington’s China policy, Kirby said, “We don’t view India as a counterweight to China. We wouldn’t approach the state visit as some sort of message-sending opportunity to China.”
Kirby stressed that Prime Minister Modi’s visit was meant to send a message to the American and Indian people about how important this bilateral relationship is to people around the world.
India has challenges of its own and they are dealing with these challenges, largely on their own. Now, they are members of the Indo-Pacific Quad and have been wonderful contributors to the multilateral shape.”
On India-Russia relations, the White House official said, “India has to make its own decisions on (Russian) oil purchases and hopefully we will continue to see that they buy Russian oil at or below the price cap, as they have been.”
On Friday, Prime Minister Modi met the tech chiefs of the United States and India in Washington, the final day of a state visit marked by pledges of deeper cooperation between the United States and India in areas including space, artificial intelligence and quantum computing.
President Joe Biden and Modi met with CEOs including Apple’s Tim Cook, Google’s Sundar Pichai and Microsoft’s Satya Nadella.
The White House said OpenAI’s Sam Altman, NASA astronaut Sunita Williams, and Indian tech leaders including Anand Mahindra, chairman of the Mahindra Group, and Mukesh Ambani, president of Reliance Industries, are among the leaders.
“Our partnership between India and the United States will go a long way, in my opinion, to define what the 21st century will look like,” Biden told the group, adding that technology cooperation will be a big part of that partnership.
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