'Obama not going to be hostile to India'

President-elect Barack Obama is not going to be hostile to India, but at the same time, he is not going to be as friendly as President George Bush, said former Ambassador to US Lalit Mansingh.

President-elect Barack Obama is not going to be hostile to India, but at the same time, he is not going to be as friendly as President George Bush, said former Foreign Secretary and former Ambassador to US, Lalit Mansingh.

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“Only the US has the political will and military capability to fight the terror in Pakistan and Afghanistan, which is very vital to Indian interests,” said Mansingh while participating in a discussion on the “Indo-US Nuclear Deal: Impact on Asian Security Framework” being chaired by former National Security Advisor, Brajesh Mishra at the Observer Research Foundation on Tuesday.

Giving the US and India perspective, Mansingh, said the US would continue its hegemony in the world irrespective of who is the president.

Mishra said America’s foreign policy under Obama would continue to be guided by its national interest. The Bush administration, he said, had been working on two key strategies of expanding eastward in the Europe and balancing of China. “Obama will also do that,” he said.

Giving the Chinese perspective, Sujit Dutta, Senior Fellow, IDSA, said though China was not happy with the Indo-US agreement, it decided to go along with the agreement because the “Chinese diplomacy was not willing to stand alone”.