Af-Pak, business ties important part of Obama`s visit to India

Washington, Oct 2 (PTI) Current situation in Pakistan
and Afghanistan, besides the global economy and bilateral
business ties will be an important part of the US President
Barack Obama's visit to India next month, the White House has
said.
"I anticipate that the world economy and our bilateral
business relationships with India will be an important aspect
of that trip," White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs told
reporters.
"From a security standpoint, obviously Afghanistan and
Pakistan and how that is all interrelated in that area of
Asia, particularly with India, will be a big focus of what the
President discusses with the (Indian) Prime Minister then,"
Gibbs said in response to a question.
Obama is scheduled to visit India in early November.
Exact dates of his trip has not been announced yet.
Earlier, Assistant Secretary of State for South and
Central Asia Robert Blake had termed President Obama's visit
as 'landmark' and said that he foresee the great nations
becoming ever closer in the years and decades to come.
"President Obama intends to make a landmark visit to
India in November to help further grow the ties between our
two knowledge societies, our economies, and our people," he
said.
Indian National Security Advisor Shivshankar Menon,
who was in Washington, had said the two countries were looking
at establishing a long-term framework of Indo-US strategic
partnership.
"The visit offers us an opportunity to put into place
a longer term framework for India-US strategic partnership,
and to add content to that partnership in several areas that
are now ripe," Menon had said at the Carnegie Endowment for
International Peace – a Washington-based think-tank.
Menon held consultations with top US officials on
issues related to the visit of the US President to India.
Among others he met the Secretary of State, Hillary
Clinton, and his American counterpart, Gen (rtd) James Jones.
PTI