India and the United States have a ‘very strong’ potential to work together, US Secretary of State nominee Antony Blinken said on Tuesday. Referring to Narendra Modi, Blinken said that the Indian Prime Minister has been a ‘very strong’ advocate of renewable energy and different technologies.
India has been a bipartisan success story for the US administration, Blinken said at his nomination confirmation hearing before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday. He further added that there are "many ways in which we can deepen that corporation".
Blinken mapped out the origin of the bipartisan relations between the US and India. He said that during the Obama administration, defence procurement and information sharing between the two countries helped deepen the cooperation and the Trump administration carried the momentum forward.
"India has been a bipartisan success story of our successive administrations. It started towards the end of the Clinton administration... During the Obama administration, we deepened cooperation on defence procurement and information sharing and the Trump administration carried that forward including its concept of Indo-Pacific and to make sure we were working with India so that no country in the region including China could challenge its sovereignty and also working with it on concerns that we share about terrorism. There are many ways we can deepen that cooperation that successive administrations have put us on," he told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.
Talking about Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Antony Blinken said: "One area that has a lot of promise and necessity is Climate. Prime Minister Modi has been a very strong advocate of renewable energy and different technologies. I think there is very strong potential for our countries to work together."
Blinken, 58, has been advising Biden on foreign policy for years. He is one of the closest advisors of President-elect Joe Biden and his name was officially announced as the nominee for the US Secretary of State post back in November.
