New Delhi:

The India-US comprehensive global strategic partnership has scaled new heights, including in areas of technology and defence, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said on Monday after US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan met him.

Jake Sullivan is on a visit to India two weeks ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th President of the US.

“It was a pleasure to meet the US National Security Advisor @JakeSullivan46,” PM Modi said on ‘X’.

“The India-US Comprehensive Global Strategic Partnership has scaled new heights, including in the areas of technology, defence, space, biotechnology and Artificial Intelligence,” he said.

“Look forward to building upon this momentum in ties between our two democracies for the benefit of our people and global good,” PM Modi added.

Jake Sullivan held wide-ranging talks with his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval and External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar. The implementation of the US-India Initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology or iCET figured in the two meetings.

The iCET was launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and US President Joe Biden in May 2022 with an aim to forge greater collaboration between India and the US in areas of critical technologies.

Last year, the two sides unveiled a raft of transformative initiatives to deepen India-US cooperation in areas of semiconductor, critical minerals, advanced telecommunication and defence space.

Jake Sullivan’s trip comes days after External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar concluded a six-day visit to the US.

(This story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)

New Delhi:

The United States National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who is on a two-day trip to India, said on Monday that the federal government in Washington is finalising necessary steps to remove barriers in India-United States civil nuclear cooperation to give fresh momentum to a landmark deal between the two countries.

“United States is now finalising the necessary steps to remove long-standing regulations that have prevented civil nuclear cooperation between India’s leading nuclear entities and US companies,” Mr Sullivan said in New Delhi on Monday.

New Delhi and Washington have been discussing the supply of US nuclear reactors to India since the mid-2000s.

The civil nuclear deal was signed in 2007 by then-President George W Bush, a major step toward allowing the United States to sell civilian nuclear technology to India. The two countries agreed in 2019 to build six US nuclear power plants in India.

However, a longstanding obstacle in the corporation has been the need to bring Indian liability rules in line with global norms which require the costs of any accident to be channelled to the operator rather than the maker of a nuclear power plant.

India’s strict nuclear compensation laws have previously discouraged foreign power plant builders from cooperating with New Delhi, subsequently deferring its target to add 20,000 MW of nuclear power from 2020 to 2030.

Jake Sullivan is on a two-day visit to New Delhi, days before President-elect Donald Trump is due to be sworn in. His trip was the last high-profile visit to New Delhi by the outgoing Biden administration.

Washington expected the impact of Chinese upstream dams, artificial intelligence, space, military licensing and Chinese economic overcapacity to be discussed while Sullivan is in New Delhi, a US official told news agency Reuters. 

Earlier in the day, Mr Sullivan met India’s Foreign Minister Dr S Jaishankar in Delhi and discussed enhancing bilateral, regional and global cooperation.

After the meeting, Mr Jaishankar acknowledged Mr Sullivan’s “personal contribution” in strengthening the India-US partnership over the past four years.

“Delighted to meet US NSA @JakeSullivan46 in New Delhi today morning. Continued our ongoing discussions on deepening bilateral, regional and global cooperation. Valued the openness of our conversations in the last four years. Appreciated his personal contribution to forging a closer and stronger India-US partnership,” he wrote in a post on X ( previously Twitter)

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar with US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan during a meeting, in New Delhi, Monday, Jan. 6, 2025
| Photo Credit: PTI

United States National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan said on Monday (January 6, 2025) that the United States is finalising necessary steps to remove barriers in India-United States civil nuclear cooperation.

The United States is finalising steps to remove roadblocks to the civil nuclear partnership with Indian companies, he said during a visit a visit to New Delhi on Monday (January 6, 2024)

He said the formal paperwork for this will be done soon. The move will allow India access restricted technology in the US.

External Affairs Minister S. Jaishankar on Monday (January 6, 2024) held talks with US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, broadly reviewing the trajectory of India-US global strategic partnership in the last four years under the Biden administration.

Mr. Sullivan is on a visit to India two weeks ahead of Donald Trump’s inauguration as the 47th president of the US.

In a post on X, Jaishankar complimented Sullivan for his “personal contribution” to forging a “closer and stronger” India-US partnership.

(With inputs from Agencies)

Outgoing U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan will travel to India January 5 and 6 to meet his counterpart Ajit K Doval and other top government officials for a final round of talks with them on a wide range of bilateral, regional and global issues and to finalise some ongoing initiatives that were important priorities for them to wrap up, the White House said on Friday.

Mr. Sullivan, 48, the youngest national security advisor when President Joe Bident appointed him on January 20, 2021, would also deliver a major India-centric foreign policy speech at IIT, New Delhi during his last trip to India before leaving office. He would be succeeded by Congressman Michael Waltz on January 20, when Donald J Trump would be sworn in as the 47th President of the United States.

Opinion | From warp speed to reset, the state of India-U.S. ties 

While there, the main purpose will be a capstone engagement and dialogue with his counterpart, National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, a senior administration official told reporters during a conference call Friday afternoon.

It will cover a range of issues across the breadth of our partnership, but with a specific focus on the strategic technology cooperation that we have had across a range of domains, from defense to space to artificial intelligence, the official added.

“The two national security advisors during this engagement will not only take stock of the progress that we have made over the last four years, which has been a historic and transformative period in this relationship as well, but also continue to finalise some ongoing initiatives that were important priorities for us to wrap up to continue our technology cooperation through the end of the administration and to identify new opportunities that we hope with an upcoming team, will continue to take forward,” said the official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

From the views of the Biden administration, the U.S.-Indian relationship has not only been one of the bright points and a real foreign policy prairie and area of legacy achievement for the Biden administration, but it is also a relationship where they have seen continued bipartisan support and momentum from administration to administration in the United States, said the official.

Mr. Sullivan will deliver a speech at IIT Delhi, in which he will emphasise how India is central not only for U.S. priorities in the Indo-Pacific, but globally. “We see this as a partnership that is really not subject to huge partisan swings in the United States but has had a really enduring basis of support that we expect will continue to move forward,” said the official.

During the visit, he will also meet External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar, as well as other Indian leaders. The U.S. delegation led by Mr. Sullivan will also have members from other government departments.

“While we are there, we will have the opportunity to meet with business leaders as well as young entrepreneurs in India, and really emphasise how much the progress that we have made in this relationship under the Biden administration is not only due to the work that has been done at a GOV to Gov level, but I think increasingly, due to the fantastic and strong relationships that exist at the people-to-people level, at company-to-company level, between the United States and India,” said the official.

“Overall, the message that we intend to leave with at the end of this trip is one of real gratitude for the friendship and the close partnership that President Biden and Prime Minister Modi have enjoyed over the last four years, but also one of tremendous optimism because we see a lot of opportunity in the future for the things that we have started with over the last four years, whether that is commercial space cooperation, looking at opportunities in the future for civil nuclear cooperation, more cooperation on green energy technology.

“We think all of these are poised, really, for exponential growth in the future. We are really proud that the Biden administration has put down such a solid foundation and made further growth possible,” the official said.

A second senior administration official told reporters that for this particular trip, Mr. Sullivan will be taking up several issues.

First, advancing the civil nuclear partnership, looking at ways how they can advance cooperation around small modular reactor technology and other forms of civil nuclear cooperation. Second, addressing People’s Republic of China overcapacity, whether talking about legacy chips or biopharma supply chains, and also aligning strategies on ICTs risks and cyber focused technology protection measures, whether talking about connected vehicles or the just announced investigation into Chinese drones.

Also Read | EAM Jaishankar, U.S. Secretary of State Blinken review advancement of U.S.-India partnership

Third, discussions around artificial intelligence and national security following the conclusion of their own national security memorandum on AI and other regulations.

Fourth, promoting the new commercial space cooperation as the U.S. finalized amendments to its own Missile Technology Control Regime for licensing policies.

Fifth, unlocking funding for U.S. India R&D partnerships under the university based local challenges institute, the second official said.