India, US working to ensure no disruption to peace in East Asia

India and the US would intensify their co-operation to ensure that there is no disruption to the peace and stability in the Asia-Pacific region "without isolating or putting down" any one, an American official said.

"If you look at East Asia, the preponderance of global GDP and preponderance of global population is to the East of India - in the Indo-Pacific space. So it is entirely logical for the US and India to be talking to each other. We have very significant long term geo-strategic and economic interest in East Asia," a senior US government official told PTI.

Diplomats from the two countries recently concluded their sixth-round of India-US East Asia Dialogue - an initiative of the Obama Administration.

The shared challenge between the US and India in the 21st century is that the two sides want to ensure the norms that have benefited them and have benefited rise of global trade and prosperity are maintained and strengthened, said the US officials, who spoke strictly on condition of anonymity.

"We all want to work together in concert to ensure rules based arbitration of international disputes," the official said, adding the countries in the region are among the top economic powers of the world.

And that is why the East Asia Dialogue makes so much sense between the US and India, the official said, noting that the discussion and meeting was to ensure there is good shared approach in reinforcing rules of the world that enhance stability, including greater transparency and greater predictability among states.

"This is not a question of isolating any one or putting down anyone," the official said, without taking the name of any country.

"We have USD 600 billion in bilateral trade and goods and services with China. India has about a USD 100 billion with China. No one is isolating anyone. There is no containment taking place here. This is about constructive engagement all around the region," the official said.

The US delegation comprised of Assistant Secretary of State for East Asian and Pacific Affairs Daniel Russel and Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asian Affairs Nisha Desai Biswal and Pacific Command (PACOM) Commander Admiral Samuel L Locklear.

Indian delegation among others included the Indian envoy S Jaishankar, Joint Secretary (East Asia) Gautam Bambawale, and Joint Secretary (Americas) Vikram Doraiswami.

Reiterating that the dialogue with Indians was not about China, the officials said diplomats discussed about the whole region.

"We obviously have shared concerns about nuclear non-proliferation in North Korea. We have shared concerns about humanitarian and disaster relief in the region. We have shared economic interest. So there is a whole bunch of reasons to talk," the official said.

The seventh round of India-US East Asia Dialogue would be held in New Delhi, for which no new dates have been set yet.

The India US East Asia Dialogue compliments "very nicely" India, the US, Japan trilateral dialogue, the official said, adding these are the two very useful initiatives, which go a long way towards tampering down the risk of any disruption to existing peace and stability in East Asia.