The United States should fully back India's pursuit of permanent membership of the powerful UN Security Council, John McCain, the top Republican leader said, days after President Barack Obama described the issue as "very difficult and complicated".
"If we want India to join us in sharing the responsibilities for international peace and security, then the world's largest democracy needs to have a seat at the high table of international politics," Senator McCain said at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. "The United States should fully back India's pursuit of permanent membership on the UN Security Council," he underlined on Friday at the Washington-based think tank.
Ahead of his visit, President Barack Obama had told PTI that the issue of India's permanent membership of the UN Security Council was "very difficult and complicated". Without committing himself to a firmer support for India's bid for permanent seat in UNSC, Obama said, "I do also expect to discuss India's role as an actor on the global stageduring my visit."
McCain's endorsement for India's bid for the UN Security Council gain significance given the bipartisan nature of support on Indo-US relationship between and the emergence of Republican Party as a strong force after the November mid-term polls, in which it gained majority in the US House of Representatives. "India must be represented in the foundational institutions of the global order. The United States should push for India's inclusion in the International Energy Agency, the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, and those parts of the global non-proliferation regime from which India is still excluded," he said.
McCain, who contested unsuccessfully against Obama in the US presidential polls in 2008, said India is also naturally poised to lead in the global promotion of democratic governance, which is increasingly a norm of the international order that our nations should foster. "It is my hope that the US can work together with India to develop its own national institutions for the promotion of democracy worldwide. "In the final calculation, the most positive feature of US-India relations is our shared democratic values, and it is ultimately our success in advancing these values together that will provide the most enduring source of security for us both," he observed.
McCain underlined that the expectations for the US-India partnership was "extremely high". "If India and the US are to build a strategic partnership, we must each want it, and commit to it, and defend it in equal measure. "And though our democratic values are our greatest source of strength, it is the domestic pressures of our democratic politics that pose perhaps the single greatest danger to our emerging partnership," he said. He underlined the need to "navigate these issues with care and forethought" because "those decisions will be significantly shaped by the actions of the other".
