High-level Indo-US talks on defence cooperation

Washington, Jan 14: India and the United States are holding four-day high-level talks from today to expand defence cooperation, including production and procurement of arms and equipment.

The Indian delegation, led by Defence Secretary Vijay Singh, will be holding parleys with US officials led by Ambassador Eric Edleman, the Under Secretary of Defence for Policy, at the Defence Policy Group (DPG) meeting on Wednesday and Thursday. Before this, the Defence Production and Procurement Group meeting will be held with the Indian side headed by the Director General of Acquisitions, S K Sharma.

This will be the eighth meeting of the defence policy group, which continues to be the primary mechanism to guide the India-US defence relationship.

At the seventh meeting of the policy group held in November 2007, the two sides exchanged intensive views on the international, strategic and security situation.

They also held discussions on the further development of bilateral defence cooperation as envisaged under the June 28, 2005 Defence Framework set in place by former US Secretary for Defence, Ronald Rumsfeld, and former Defence Minister Pranab Mukherjee.

The two sides are likely to look at increasing the transfers of military equipment and technology.

The US has indicated it is ready to renew the supply of defence items, lifting the sanctions, which were imposed after India conducted nuclear tests in 1998.

ANI