'India free to pursue diplomatic goals'

Washington, Aug 8: State Department Deputy Spokesman Tom Casey has said India, like any other country in the world, is free to establish diplomatic relations with whatever countries it wants.

''The United States is not going to, you know, be in a position to make those determinations for others,'' he said when his attention was drawn to India's Ambassador to the US Ronen Sen's reported statement that linking the US-India Civil Nuclear Agreement with Iran or any other issue would be completely counter-productive.

Mr Sen was also quoted having said, ''it would be totally unrealistic to expect a large and vibrant democracy like India to give up its independence of judgment and action. The sooner this is realised the better.'' Casey, however, said ''We (the United States) have some unique issues in terms of Iran. But what we would hope is that India would continue, as it has in the past, to support the broader international community effort to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon and to prevent Iran from being a destabilising factor in the region.'' ''And when we have discussions with our Indian friends, certainly, what we tell them and what we ask them is to keep those kinds of considerations in mind in terms of any relationship that they do move forward with, with the Iranian Government,'' the State Department spokesman said.

UNI