NEW DELHI: US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta promised yesterday to let India buy America's best weapons technology and jointly produce and develop equipment in a bid to increase trade with the world's top arms importer.
"The United States is firmly committed to providing the best defense technology possible to India. We are both leaders in technology development and we can do incredible work together," he said on a visit to the Indian capital.
New Delhi and Washington are close partners on defense issues with some $8 billion of arms sales under their belts, moving past decades of distrust, although the United States lost out on a major fighter jet deal this year after offering old technology.
"We must move beyond a focus on individual arms sales to regular cooperation that increases the quantity and quality of our defense trade," he said, adding that Washington was moving to reform export controls that have limited weapons transfers to India.
Panetta also called on New Delhi to modernize its defense procurement rules and nuclear liability legislation and said the Pentagon would work with Indian leaders to cut red tape and speed up defense sales.
"I think close partnership with America will be key to meeting India's own stated aims of a modern and effective defense force," he said.
Panetta noted that India and the United States both see China as having "a critical role to play advancing security and prosperity in this region."
"The United States welcomes the rise of a strong, prosperous and a successful China that plays a greater role in global affairs - and respects and enforces the international norms that have governed this region for six decades," he said. Panetta also said that the US would continue to attack Al-Qaeda in Pakistan despite complaints from Islamabad that the drone strikes violate its sovereignty.
"We have made it very clear that we are going to continue to defend ourselves," he said in India a day after the US announced the killing of Al-Qaeda's number two Abu Yahya al-Libi.
"This is about our sovereignty as well," Panetta added, arguing that Al-Qaeda militants who orchestrated the September 11 attacks on the United States were in Pakistan's tribal areas.
"The leadership of those who were involved in planning this attack are located in Pakistan, in the FATA (Federally Administered Tribal Areas)," he said.
Panetta confirmed the strike on a "another deputy leader" of the terror group, referring to al-Libi who once escaped from a US jail in Afghanistan and had escaped previous assassination attempts.
A trusted lieutenant of Osama bin Laden, Libi appeared in countless Al-Qaeda videos and was considered the chief architect of its global propaganda machine.
