In many ways, the Washingto.
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Obama said India and the United States were the largest democracies in the world.
Addressing the media jointly with Modi after over hour-long talks at the White House, Obama said it was natural for India and the USA, two biggest democracies, to “deepen and broaden” partnership.
Speaking to media after nearly twohour dialogue at the White House, the seventh meeting between the two leaders since 2014, both listed areas of cooperation from regional security, terrorism, cyber security, climate change and clean energy to economic partnership. He referred to Obama as “my close friend” and said the two nations will continue working “shoulder to shoulder”.
India and U.S. are the largest democracies in the world. “That is something that the Paris agreement invited countries to do, to put together a mid-century low greenhouse gas emissions strategy”. Modi will also address the joint meeting of US Congress.
Last week a senior USA lawmaker raised concerns over India’s human rights record, noting that the 2015 TIP report indicated that Indian officials at various levels of government were complicit in human trafficking.
Other joint announcements, though, seemed to illustrate the major challenges in securing concrete progress on climate.
“Importantly, in an election year, Modi will likely note the bipartisan nature of the [U.S. -India] relationship – there’s no indication yet that he will or wants to meet any of the presidential candidates on this visit”, Tanvi Madan, a fellow in the foreign policy program at the Washington, D.C. -based nonprofit Brookings Institution, said in a note released last week.
The Nuclear Power Corporation of India and USA firm Westinghouse will immediately begin engineering and site design work for the AP1000 nuclear reactors and conclude contractual arrangements by June 2017. “He committed his country to standards that will be good for the Indian people, but more importantly, will be good for the rest of the world, too”, Earnest said.
“This statement should provide significant momentum towards this global push”, he said. “They have two pretty lengthy meetings”. For the first time, PM Modi would not address Indian Diaspora on a grand scale.
He is visiting the United States at the invitation of Obama, who in the a year ago of his presidency is inviting a few world leaders with whom he shared a “close and productive working relationship”. “India is a young country and we are aware of the talent it has”.
The respect is particularly sweet in Washington.
Modi, who rose to prominence as a leader of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, was denied a visa to visit the U.S.in 2005, three years after religious riots killed more than 1,000 Muslims in the western state of Gujarat, where he was then the top official.
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During his five-nation six-day sojourn, Modi has already visited Afghanistan, Qatar and Switzerland. The rationale behind today’s summit decision is the Modi government’s belief that defence cooperation with the USA needs to be advanced in mutual interest even if political roadblocks are coming in the way of signing three foundational agreements with the Pentagon.
