US holds rare meeting on Indo-US economic relationship

Lalit K Jha

Washington, July 21 (PTI) Signifying the changing focus
of the Obama administration towards India a key advisory
committee of the State Department on International Economic
Policy held a rare meeting on Indo-US economic relationship.

The Advisory Committee on International Economic Policy
meets four times a year. It is possibly for the first time
that the committee held a discussion on India-US economic
relationship.

This was done at the request of the State Department, the
Advisory Committee Chairman Ted Kassinger told PTI after the
meeting.

"There are comments from a number of committee members on
intellectual property rights and on government procurement
areas where concern was expressed about an offset. There was a
lot of interest in support of the idea of developing
cooperation in environmental technology," he said.

Members of the committee were earlier briefed by the
Secretary of State for South and Central Asia (Deputy
Assistant on Indo-US economic relationship) Michael Owen.

There was a lot of support to renew efforts to get the
Doha round moving forward, Kassinger said. Members also
discussed issues revolving around climate change, and what
India's role would be at the upcoming Copenhagen Summit later
this year.

"There is hope that there would be progress," Kassinger
said. PTI LKJ
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