US, India totally aligned on Indo-Pacific partnership: US State Department official 

New York: Highlighting India’s special place in the Indo-Pacific, a US State Department official has said that there was “virtually no daylight” between the approaches of the two countries to the strategy for the region, and reaffirmed commitment to Washington’s “multi-faceted” and “vital” partnership.

Jonathan Henick, a Deputy Assistant Secretary for South Asia, said on Thursday: “The India-US partnership stands on a shared commitment to uphold the rule of law, freedom of navigation, democratic values, counter-terrorism cooperation and private sector-led economic growth, so it is not surprising that there is virtually no daylight in our approaches to the Indo-Pacific.”

“Growing our broad and multifaceted strategic partnership with India” was an important facet of the US’s approach to the Indo-Pacific, he said during a digital briefing from Washington.

Asked about Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s recent assertion that the US Indo-Pacific strategy was to exclude China, Walter Douglas, a Deputy Assistant Secretary for East Asian and Pacific Affairs, said: “It excludes no nation, every nation should be part of it.”

He said that although the approach to the Indo-Pacific has been called a strategy, “it is really a vision for how we see the region going forward”.

“It is a restatement and upgrading, and the inclusion of India in this wider vision” because it can bring prosperity to the region, he added.

Earlier this month, Lavrov slammed the US construct of the Indo Pacific. “Why do you need to call Asia-Pacific as Indo-Pacific? The answer is evident — to exclude China,” he said at the Raisina Dialogue in New Delhi. (IANS)

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