Washington DC. India and the United States have committed to strengthen bilateral security and civil nuclear cooperation, including the establishment of six US nuclear power plants in India.

The two sides exchanged views on a wide range of global security and nonproliferation challenges and reaffirmed their commitment to work together to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) and their delivery systems and to deny access to such weapons by terrorists and non-state actors. The United States reaffirmed its strong support of India’s early membership in the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).

The above matters came up for discussion during the ninth (9th) round of India-US Strategic Security Dialogue held in Washington DC on March 13. The Indian delegation was led by Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale while the US delegation was led by Andrea Thompson, Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security.

Earlier on March 12 Indra Mani Pandey, Additional Secretary for Disarmament and International Security Affairs, Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, and Dr Yleem DS Poblete, US Assistant Secretary of State for Arms Control, Verification and Compliance, co-chaired the third round of the India-US Space Dialogue, where they discussed trends in space threats; respective national space priorities; and opportunities for cooperation bilaterally and in multilateral fora.