Jake Sullivan says US finalize steps to strengthen nuke energy cooperation with India

By Anjali Sharma

WASHINGTON- US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan on Monday held talks with NSA Ajit Doval on space, defence, strategic technology cooperation.

Sullivan announced that the United States is now finalizing the necessary steps to remove long-standing regulations that have prevented civil nuclear cooperation between India’s leading nuclear entities and US companies.

”The formal paperwork will be done soon but this will be an opportunity to turn the page on some of the frictions of the past and create opportunities for entities that have been on restricted lists in the United States to come off those lists and enter into deep collaboration with the United States, with our private sector, scientists and technologists to move civil nuclear cooperation forward together,” he said at the event.

Mr Sullivan is in New Delhi to hold talks with National Security Advisor Ajit Doval on issues such as space, defence, strategic technology cooperation as well as shared security priorities in the Indo-Pacific region.

He is the top outgoing official of the Biden administration in the US before the President elect Mr Donald Trump’s inauguration as the new president on January 20.

He recalled that former US President Bush and former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh laid out a vision of civil nuclear cooperation nearly 20 years ago, he regretted that the two countries have yet to fully realise it.”But as we work to build clean energy technologies to enable growth in artificial intelligence, and to help US and Indian energy companies unlock their innovation potential, the Biden administration has determined that it is past time to take the next major step in cementing this partnership,” he added.

Mr Sullivan stated that it was Mr Doval who had always viewed that technology and particularly advanced technologies of the future would be a propellant for the US-India relationship in a way that could take the two countries forward, advance their respective interests, protect their respective values and build a better world for everybody.

”During the past four years, he (Mr Doval) and I have developed a deep personal and professional relationship that has played a critical role in ensuring that the US-India partnership has reached that new high level that I talked about before,” he said.

External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar held talks with Mr Sullivan on Indo-US ties and hailed the latter’s contribution in strengthening the relationship between the two nations.

Mr Jaishankar wrote on ‘X’ after the meeting ”Delighted to meet US NSA @JakeSullivan46 in New Delhi today morning. Continued our ongoing discussions on deepening bilateral, regional and global cooperation. Valued the openness of our conversations in the last four years. Appreciated his personal contribution to forging a closer and stronger India-US partnership,”.