NEW DELHI: India and the United States on Monday committed to action to address barriers to bilateral strategic trade, technology and industrial cooperation.
The commitment was made at a meeting between the national security advisers of the two countries, Ajit Doval and Jake Sullivan, during Sullivan’s two-day visit to New Delhi.
The US and India are forging deeper strategic ties, with mutual concerns about an ascendant China in the Indo-Pacific region, even though India has maintained its close relationship with Russia despite its invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Sullivan and his Indian counterpart chaired the second meeting of the India-US initiative on Critical and Emerging Technology, which they launched in January 2023.
Without naming any country, a joint fact sheet of the meeting shared by the Indian government said Sullivan and Doval “resolved to prevent the leakage of sensitive and dual-use technologies to countries of concern.”
They also launched a new strategic semiconductor partnership between US and Indian companies for precision-guided ammunition and other national security-focused electronics platforms, it said.
They also agreed to co-invest in a lithium resource project in South America and a rare earths deposit in Africa “to diversify critical mineral supply chain” and committed to soon conclude a bilateral critical minerals pact for graphite, gallium and germanium.
Last year, during Modi’s state visit to Washington, India had announced buying 31 MQ-9B drones from General Atomic, and the two countries had started discussions to jointly produce General Electric’s fighter jet engines by Hindustan Aeronautics in India, which is yet to be finalized.
Sullivan and Doval also discussed possible co-production of land warfare systems.
The visit is the first by a high-ranking US official since Prime Minister Narendra Modi returned to office with the help of allies as his party failed to win a majority.
Modi met US President Joe Biden on the sidelines of the G7 Summit in Italy last week. Sullivan met Modi and Foreign Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar earlier in the day.
The relationship between Washington and New Delhi has been tested after the US accused Indian government agents of plotting to murder a Sikh separatist leader on US soil last year, after Canada made similar allegations. India dismissed the Canadian accusations, but initiated an investigation into the US allegations.
The US has extradited an Indian national from the Czech Republic, whom it has indicted for the foiled assassination plot.
There have also been some concerns raised about the treatment of minorities in India.
India and US to address barriers to trade and cooperation
India and US to address barriers to trade and cooperation
Nepal’s rapper-turned-politician takes early lead in key polls
- The polls are one of the most hotly contested elections in the Himalayan republic of 30 million people since the end of a civil war in 2006
Nepal’s centrist party of rapper-turned-politician Balendra Shah took an early lead in the high-stakes parliamentary election on Friday, as slow counting continued after the first polls since last year’s deadly uprising.
But despite Shah’s party loyalists dancing on the streets of Katmandu in celebration — the numbers of votes counted remain too low to be confident that it will translate into concrete wins.
By Friday afternoon, 24 hours after polls closed, early trends issued by the Election Commission put Shah’s Rastriya Swatantra Party ahead.
HIGHLIGHT
Alongside Shah, key figures vying for power include Marxist leader KP Sharma Oli, four-time prime minister who was ousted by the September 2025 anti-corruption protests, and the newly elected leader of the Nepali Congress party, Gagan Thapa.
Alongside Shah, key figures vying for power include Marxist leader KP Sharma Oli, four-time prime minister who was ousted by the September 2025 anti-corruption protests, and the newly elected leader of the Nepali Congress party, Gagan Thapa.
At 5:00 p.m. (1115 GMT), RSP was leading in more than half of the 165 constituencies.
But there were only two declared results, and RSP had been confirmed only in one, the same as Nepali Congress.
Prakash Nyupane, a spokesman for the Election Commission, said that counting was ongoing “in a peaceful manner” across the Himalayan nation, from snowbound high-altitude mountain regions to the hot plains bordering India.
Voters have chosen who replaces the interim government in place since the September 2025 uprising, in which at least 77 people were killed, and parliament and scores of government buildings were torched.
Youth-led protests under a loose Gen Z banner began as a demonstration against a brief social media ban, but were fed by wider grievances at corruption and a woeful economy.
Kunda Dixit, publisher of the weekly Nepali Times, told AFP that if trends did reflect final wins, the political shift was dramatic.
“This is even a bigger upset than we expected — it underscores the level of public disenchantment with the old parties for under-performance, as well as anger over the events of September,” he said.
‘Fate of the country’
The polls are one of the most hotly contested elections in the Himalayan republic of 30 million people since the end of a civil war in 2006.
All eyes are watching the results in the key head-to-head battleground constituency of Jhapa-5, a usually sleepy eastern district, where 35-year-old Shah challenged directly the veteran Oli, aged 74.
Shah, better known as Balen, snappily dressed in a black suit and sunglasses, has cast himself as a symbol of youth-driven political change.
At 5 p.m. local time, at 10 percent of the votes counted in Jhapa-5, Shah was ahead by nearly five times as many votes as Oli.
Soldiers with armored trucks manned barbed wire barricades around the counting center in Jhapa.
“I hope this result changes the fate of the country for the better,” Bhagawati Adhikari, 38, told AFP, who was among a crowd of dozens at Jhapa gathered outside the security cordon.
“The country should be peaceful and secure, youth should get opportunities, corruption should stop — that’s my appeal.”
’Rest peacefully’
More than 3,400 candidates ran for 165 seats in direct elections to the 275-member House of Representatives, the lower chamber of parliament, with 110 more chosen via party lists. Turnout was 59 percent.
Full nationwide tallies could take several days.
Dixit raised the possibility that Shah’s RSP could stage a dramatic win.
“If RSP hits the magic 138 seats, Balen will become prime minister — and hopefully a cabinet of technocrats,” added Dixit.
Sushila Karki, the interim prime minister, praised the peaceful conduct of a vote she has said was critical in “determining our future.”
Karki, a 73-year-old former chief justice who reluctantly left retirement to lead the nation, now faces the challenge of managing the reaction to results.
The election saw a wave of younger candidates promising to tackle Nepal’s dismal economy, challenging veteran politicians who have dominated for decades and argue that their experience guarantees stability and security.
In Jhapa, 68-year-old shopkeeper Ved Prasad Mainali sat listening to a radio.
