(Image source from: NDTV.com)
The Trump administration has restated its support for India's bid for a permanent seat on a reformed United Nations Security Council, a senior United States official said, emphasizing that the two "global partners" share a commitment to work together on global challenges like denuclearization of the Korean peninsula.
Alice Wells, a Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary for the Bureau of South and Central Asia Region said the U.S. Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs David Hale met Indian Foreign Secretary Vijay Gokhale at the opening of the week of the 73rd Session of the UN General Assembly to build on the momentum of the first 2+2 meeting between the U.S. and India in New Delhi as well as to reaffirm the strategic convergence that Washington sees in the bilateral ties.
"We really are global partners and the meeting (between Hale and Gokhale) reaffirmed our shared commitment to working together on international challenges - from a denuclearized Korean Peninsula to a peaceful and prosperous Afghanistan," Wells told reporters on Friday during a briefing on the U.S. priorities in the South and Central Asia Region.
The American diplomat said the U.S. reiterates its support for India's role in a reformed UN Security Council.
The New York meeting was a continuation of the discussion at the 2+2 meeting.
"It's a conversation that really covers the map in terms of how we can work together in Afghanistan, what we are doing to promote free and open Indo-Pacific and also in particular, how we are both very supportive of the democratic developments that we see transpiring in the Maldives," she said.
Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi and the U.S. too congratulated Maldives' President-elect Ibrahim Mohamed Solih, saying they had peacefully raised their voices to determine the future of their country.
During Modi's visit to Washington in June earlier this year, Trump supported India's bid for a permanent seat in a reformed UNSC and in other multilateral institutions such as the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
"As global non-proliferation partners, the U.S. expressed strong support for India's early membership in the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the Wassenaar Arrangement, and the Australia Group," a joint statement issued after the meeting between Modi and Trump had said.
By Sowmya Sangam
