External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj and United States Secretary of State Rex Tillerson have mutually agreed to increase the global fight against militancy. During the first telephonic conversation on Wednesday, the two decided to work closely “to further expand and deepen the multi-faceted strategic partnership between India and the US”, said the ministry.
Apart from security, the two countries would also focus on cooperation in the fields of economy and energy. Earlier, Tillerson had telephone conversations with the foreign ministers of Australia, Japan and South Korea. Swaraj is, in fact, the 12th foreign minister Tillerson has spoken with after he assumed office earlier this month, reported The Telegraph.
The Swaraj-Tillerson conversation toes the line set by Narendra Modi and Donald Trump. On January 24, Modi and Trump had discussed similar cooperation and had decided to “cooperate closely” to combat the rising menace of militancy. Modi had said that he had had a “warm conversation” with the new US president.
Modi had also raised the concerns related to H-1B and L1 visas. The matter of Indian workers obtaining visas for jobs in the US has been a concern since Trump’s campaign days. However, Trump was non-committal about it.
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