US has a compelling stake in India's success: John McCain

Noting that the US has a compelling stake in the success of India, a top Republican Senator today called for continued bipartisan approach to the US-Indian relationship.

Senator John McCain, a top leader of the Republican Party's that has gained majority in the House of Representatives in recent elections, said that India and the US should increasingly align their policies and instruments of national power to achieve three strategic goals.

"First, to shape the development of South Asia as a region of sovereign, democratic states that contribute to one another's security and prosperity. Second, to create a preponderance of power in the Asia-Pacific region that favours free societies, free markets, free trade, and free commons.

And finally, to strengthen a Liberal international order and an open global economy that safeguard human dignity and foster peaceful development," McCain said in his address to the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, a Washington-based think tank.

"In South Asia, India's immediate neighbourhood, US and Indian interests could not be more congruent. India's former foreign secretary, Shyam Saran, put it well: 'India would like the whole of South Asia to emerge as a community of flourishing democracies.'

That is the US aim as well, not just because it is good in itself for the peoples of the region, but also because a democratic South Asia is the greatest guarantor of regional peace and prosperity. This, in turn, can provide India with the stable periphery it needs to continue its remarkable rise to power," McCain said.

"The main challenge to this common vision, as well as a central threat to US and Indian security, is the violent Islamist extremism emanating from Afghanistan and Pakistan. My last visit to India was, by chance, just days after the tragic date that Indians mark as 26/11, the  terror attacks in Mumbai," he said.

"Being in India then was like experiencing September 11th all over again, and the restraint shown by Prime Minister (Manmohan) Singh was an amazing act of statesmanship.

This only reaffirmed my deep-seated belief that India has every sovereign right to defend itself, its people, and its democratic way of life. And the US should continue to support this goal through enhanced intelligence sharing and counterterrorism cooperation," McCain said.

The emergence of a strategic partnership with India has been one of the most consequential bipartisan successes of recent US foreign policy, McCain said.