Obama calls up PM, discusses Afghanistan, climate change

United States President Barack Obama called Prime Minister Manmohan Singh over the telephone this morning and discussed with him the situation in Afghanistan and the further steps that could be taken to bring peace and stability in the strife-torn country.

During their brief conversation, the two leaders also discussed the coming summit on Climate Change in Copenhagen.

Dr Singh told Mr Obama that India would play a constructive role in the negotiations and looked forward to a successful outcome, an official statement added.

The telephone call came just days after Dr Singh had met Mr Obama in the White House in Washington on November 24 during his state visit to the US.

The call was part of Mr Obama's effort to brief key US allies and friends about the new strategy for Afghanistan that he is slated to outline in an address to the American people on Tuesday.

Among other things, there is expectation that Mr Obama will announce the deployment of about 30,000 additional US troops to strengthen security in the population centres in Afghanistan, push back the Taliban and provide training to Afghan security forces.

Mr Obama had discussed with Dr Singh, during their meeting in Washington, the review of his Afghanistan policy.

Ahead of his visit to Washington, the Prime Minister had said in an interview to Newsweek that it was very important, both for providing security and for providing sustained development, that the US and the global community should stay engaged with Afghanistan.

At their meeting, the two leaders had reiterated their shared interest in the stability, development and independence of Afghanistan and in the defeat of terrorist safe havens in Pakistan and Afghanistan. President Obama appreciated India’s role in reconstruction and rebuilding efforts in Afghanistan. The two leaders agreed to enhance their respective efforts in this direction.

From Washington, Dr Singh had travelled to Port of Spain, Trinidad & Tobago, where he told the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM 2009) that India was willing to sign on to an ambitious global target for emissions reductions or limiting temperature increase but made it clear that this must be accompanied by an equitable burden sharing paradigm.

He had emphasised the need for the outcome at the 15th Conference of Parties (COP) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change to be held in Copenhagen later this month to be comprehensive, balanced and, above all, equitable.

He had said it must be comprehensive in the sense that it must cover all the inter-related components of mitigation, adaptation, finance and technology.

He had said that this meant that a partial outcome must be resisted and that there must be balance and equal priority given to each of the four components.

"Mitigation is important but cannot take precedence over adaptation which, for many countries represented here, poses a greater challenge. And most important from our perspective, is the need to ensure an equitable outcome corresponding to the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities," he had said.

The Prime Minister had said that if the outcome at Copenhagen diminished rather than enhanced the implementation of the UNFCCC in respect of the specific components of mitigation, adaptation, finance and technology, it would represent a serious setback, no matter how the result was characterised.

NNN