Vajpayee trip to US likely in August

WASHINGTON, APRIL 8: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee's visit to the United States, in response to Bill Clinton's invitation extended d...

WASHINGTON, APRIL 8: Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee’s visit to the United States, in response to Bill Clinton’s invitation extended during the American President’s India visit, may take place in late August or early September, New Delhi’s Ambassador to Washington Naresh Chandra has said.

The way the Clinton visit went in India was simply "fantastic" and the institutional structures set up during it "will help US to exploit in good time and in quick time the potential which has been identified", the Atlantic Council here yesterday.

Chandra expected the coming months to be a period of intense activity to move the relatons of the two countries forward.

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"We have recognised there are also hurdles. There are legislative hurdles and sanctions are still in place but we are working generally to reduce these artificial barriers to maximise the utilisation of the potential that exists," he said.

"We are planning an early meeting of our External Affairs Minister Jaswant Singh with the Secretary of State (Madeleine Albright) and a whole lot of preparation would go into that," said Chandra.

He said Finance Minister Yashwant Sinha will meet Treasury Secretary Larry Summers and may sign an agreement for economic and commercial cooperation during a forthcoming trip here.

The whole idea behind all these activities, said Chandra, was to enable a very productive meeting between Clinton and Vajpayee.

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Business to business activity will continue and the India visit by a number of US-India Business Council executives with Clinton will be returned by the Confederation of Indian Industry and the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry, he said.