U.S. Secretary of State Blinken to address India-U.S. Forum
U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will address the sixth India-U.S. Forum in New Delhi today.
India’s Minister of Foreign Affairs Subrahmanyam Jaishankar will join Blinken and other top officials at the two-day Forum, which follows the 13th India-U.S. Trade Policy Forum held in Washington, D.C. on Wednesday. The India-U.S. Forum is expected to be centered around the war in Ukraine, Afghanistan-Pakistan relations, defense production, emerging technology and data governance.
U.S.-India bilateral relations have seen increased engagement in both the defense and economic sectors amid more proactive Indian foreign policy and as the U.S. seeks to boost its ties with the world’s fifth largest economy. India is seeing steady growth despite global inflation and is projected to record a real GDP growth rate of 7% in 2023, a slight decrease from its pre-Covid recovery that saw India leap from 6.6% real GDP growth in 2021 to 8.7% in 2022.
As members of the QUAD and the Indo-Pacific Economic Framework (IPEF), both will see increases in defense and technology production in the short-term. However, India’s strong diplomatic position amid the Russia’s war in Ukraine will put distance between India’s alignment with the West, as the country drives a policy of assertiveness.
