National security advisor endorses American view, tries to cool down temperatures four days before president Barack Obama’s visit
Four days before American president Barack Obama’s touchdown in Mumbai, the Centre was trying to cool down heat generated by home secretary GK Pillai’s remarks that the US did not share sufficient information on 26/11 mastermind David Coleman Headley.
National security advisor (NSA) Shiv Shankar Menon tried to play down Pillai’s remarks on Tuesday saying access given by the US with regard to Headley was unprecedented and such cooperation may not have been possible five years ago.
“In India, there is a debate on how much did the US know about Headley, at what time and how much did they tell us. If you look at the broader picture, the kind of access we got to Headley is unprecedented. This is not what many states do very easily,” he said at a seminar on India-US relations by FICCI and Brookings Institution in New Delhi.
Menon’s statement is similar to what the US administration has been saying. Washington’s recent assurances to India on sharing more information about Headley after a fresh ongoing review are being viewed as a renewed attempt to buy peace before the presidential visit.
Pillai had expressed disappointment at the US not sharing specific information on Headley, but Menon said the dissatisfaction over certain aspects of the Indo-US ties was because people expected more out of this growing relationship.
“People expect much more. So, a lot of dissatisfaction we hear, whether it is outsourcing or counter-terrorism,” he said.
“The level of engagement between our two countries is unprecedented. We never had this kind of engagement with each other in our history. There is no sphere of human endeavour in which we do not actually cooperate. The range of our engagement is unprecedented,” NSA said.
He said the visit of Obama had given both the countries an opportunity to actually put in practice, not just showcase, what we actually practice.
Menon said he was “very optimistic” about the future of Indo-US ties and the best thing for the two countries to do was to have a pragmatic approach in furthering the relationship. “I think we should do what we do best. We should be pragmatic and work the relationship where it works... I think we have the moment where we can be ambitious about the relationship,” he said.
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