US, India Launch Economic Partnership

The U.S. treasury secretary and India's finance minister have kicked off what they are calling a new economic and financial partnership between the two countries.

U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was hosted by Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee at the first meeting of the partnership.

During a brief news conference afterwards, Geithner spoke of the potential for cooperation between the two giant economies, but he was short on offering specifics.

"We're at a time of great optimism in the United States and around the world about the prospects for growth and reform in India," he said. "And I think we have a chance to demonstrate together that this economic relationship offers very promising growth and opportunities for American firms just as it does for Indian firms."

VOA Photo - S. Herman

Indian Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee speaks to reporters in New Delhi, 06 Apr 2010

Mukherjee suggested opportunities for American investment in India's booming infrastructure expansion. "In a five-year period more than 600 billion U.S. dollars could be invested in ports, in roads, in communications," he said.

Both officials steered clear of mentioning China or its currency policy, which is under intense international scrutiny.

The U.S. Treasury Department has delayed a report it had been scheduled to release next week which will make a determination on whether Beijing is manipulating its currency, the yuan.

Geithner, who spent five years of his childhood living in the Indian capital, is on his first trip to the country as Treasury secretary. He is to meet with business leaders in the country's commercial capital, Mumbai, on Wednesday.

Geithner met with Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh after visiting a mobile banking site in New Delhi Tuesday morning.

Domestic media reports say the visiting U.S. official asked Indian leaders for greater access to financial services markets, such as insurance.

While relations have warmed between Washington and New Delhi in recent years, efforts to reach economic accords between the two democracies have always been difficult. Their disagreements, especially about the agricultural sector, are blamed for leading to the scuttling in 2008 of global trade negotiations.

Despite the differences, American investment in India has been expanding - increasing by ten times during the past decade while total two-way trade during that time frame has tripled.

Afghan Leader's Comments Puzzle Officials

Recent comments by Afghan President Hamid Karzai have set off alarm bells in Washington and other capitals. His comments trouble officials and puzzle analysts.

Afghan President Hamid Karzai's verbal broadsides against the West have sparked concern and genuine puzzlement. Why is Mr. Karzai, to use the old adage, biting the hand that feeds him?

Former U.N. Deputy Envoy to Afghanistan Peter Galbraith, who Mr. Karzai singled out in his accusations of vote fraud, offers the most commonly heard explanation. Galbraith, who dismisses as preposterous the notion that he engineered the vote fraud from which Mr. Karzai benefited, says the Afghan leader is simply fed up with Western pressure on him to clean up his government.

"Karzai's game is as it always has been. It is all about Hamid Karzai and staying in power," Galbraith said. "That is why his appointees, almost certainly with his knowledge and support, organized the fraudulent election results. He had a cozy relationship with the United Nations and the United States under President [George W.] Bush, because nobody asked anything of him. But now President Obama is asking things of him. He does not like it, and he is lashing out."

Hamid Karzai is the only leader post-Taliban Afghanistan has known. He won his second five-year term in last year's controversial election. Former E.U. Special Envoy to Afghanistan, Francesc Vendrell, who knows the president well, says Mr. Karzai is a very different man now than he was when Western nations essentially installed him as leader of Afghanistan after the fall of the Taliban in 2001.

"We have to remember that he is very isolated in his palace, that he is surrounded by lackeys who feed him what they think he would like to hear," Vendrell said. "And if he gets into a particular mood, then they all ensure that he keeps it up and offer reasons why he should be tough. I think in some ways he sounds to be crazy. But in some ways he also sounds to be very sane, trying to see how far he can push the envelope."

But other analysts think there may be something more at work than personal pique. The president is already negotiating with one insurgent faction led by former prime minister Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and has said that reconciling with at least some of the Taliban is the way he wants to proceed.

Larry Goodson of the U.S. Army War College says Mr. Karzai is trying to put some distance between himself and the West in anticipation of the day when the United States and NATO are no longer around to prop him up.

"I think that in reality he is really trying to position himself between the opposition and between the West by using the West as a whipping boy, knowing that the West is already committed in the form of President Obama's speech at West Point to putting in all these forces for a period of time," Goodson said.

Goodson says Mr. Karzai may resent the pressure on him. But, he adds, the United States has little choice but to continue to push him to eliminate corruption if there is any chance to win Afghans' hearts and minds over to the government side, which is central to counterinsurgency.

"Therefore, we have to try to improve the legitimacy of the government, which means we have to press him on corruption, even though we have got no chance of getting him to really change that," Goodson said. "And even if we found him with his hand in the cookie jar, what could we do about it? I mean, imagine that for a moment: we catch Karzai himself personally corrupt. Then what?"

Former EU Envoy Vendrell acknowledges that bringing pressure to bear is difficult given that the Afghan leader knows full well that any threat of an immediate U.S. troop pullout would be an empty one. But he says there are other avenues of pressure, such as cutting subsidies to pay tribal leaders and funds to run the presidential office.

"There are a series of things that could be cut of the kind that he personally would hate, including, incidentally, being invited on official visits abroad, I mean, to the West," Vendrell said.

President Karzai is due to visit Washington next month.

More Afghan Civilians Dead; US, NATO Commander Addresses Elders

NATO officials in Afghanistan are investigating the latest deaths of civilians caused by an air strike and a clash with insurgents in the southern as well as eastern parts of the country. The probe comes as the U.S commander of foreign forces in Afghanistan has assured a traditional assembly of Afghan leaders his troops are making utmost efforts to avoid civilian casualties in what he described as "a difficult war".

NATO says its forces carried out an air strike Monday night on a compound in the district of Nahr-e-Saraj in southern Helmand province after coming under fire from insurgents hiding inside. NATO officials say four civilians, including two women and a child died in the airstrike.

It says the troops came to know about the presence of civilians, only after they entered the compound. NATO says that bodies of four suspected male insurgents were also found inside.

The second incident occurred in the eastern Kapisa province where a clash between NATO troops and Taliban insurgents wounded four children. One of the children died of wounds.

Both incidents are being investigated to determine whether NATO forces killed civilians.

Addressing a big gathering of tribal elders, religious scholars and political leaders from across Afghanistan in Kabul Tuesday, General Stanley McChrystal, commander of U.S. and NATO forces in the country, acknowledged his forces sometimes make mistakes and bring harm to civilians.

AP

US and NATO Forces in Afghanistan Commander Gen. Stanley McChrystal (File)

"When such unfortunate events occur we quickly investigate what happened and we admit our mistakes. While we strive to never bring harm to any civilian this is a difficult war," said McChrystal. "But the insurgents who place improvised explosive devices on your roads, who fire rockets into your neighborhoods, who use your women and children as human shields, they demonstrate everyday their disrespect for human life and never take responsibility or apologize for their actions," he said.

Last year, General McChrystal issued strict guidelines to limit air strikes against militants to avoid civilian casualties. But in Tuesday's address to the political gathering in the Afghan capital, the American commander said that too many local and coalition forces have also lost their lives or have been badly wounded while defending Afghans against suicide and other terrorist attacks.

"We are humans like you. We struggle here with you far from our homes and our families sharing your concerns about the challenges facing your communities," he explained. "We are proud to have paid in our blood as you have paid in yours to protect you from those who threaten Afghan security and to rob your children of a better future. We share this responsibility with you and feel the pain it comes with any loss of innocent life," said McChrystal.

The issue of civilian casualties in the fight against Taliban insurgents has been a source of tension between the Afghan government and NATO-led international forces. The latest such incidents have taken place amid a war of words between President Hamid Karzai and U.S officials. Critics say that the political tension could undermine international efforts to defeat the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan.

The Afghan president in a recent speech to lawmakers is reported to have threatened to join the Taliban if foreigners do not stop meddling in Afghanistan.

Washington has described Mr. Karzai's comments as troubling and has urged him to carefully choose his words. The State Department spokesman has warned such comments could undercut U.S support for the Afghan mission.

President Karzai in his statement also accused the United Nations and international community of perpetrating election fraud in last year's presidential polls to try to tarnish his victory. U.N and U.S officials have rejected the charges, which many believe are meant to blame outsiders for Afghanistan's internal troubles, including growing corruption in the government departments.