December 5, 2001	Wednesday	Ramazan 19, 1422

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NEW DELHI, Dec 4: The United States and India on Tuesday announced sweeping plans for defence cooperation, including joint training of special forces and air and maritime programmes.

In a joint statement, the two countries said they had also agreed to “add new emphasis” in their defence cooperation on counter-terrorism initiatives and nuclear-proliferation issues.

The announcements were a clear departure from previous Indo-US defence ties, which were stunted by US decision to impose sanctions after India’s N-tests. The statement came at the end of two days of talks here between military planners of India and the United States led by Douglas Feith, under-secretary for policy in the US defence department.

India and the United States will begin joint training for “combined humanitarian airlift, special operations training, small unit group exercises and training exercises between US marines and corresponding Indian forces”, it said.

The officials also said all issues relating to joint training would be finalized and put into operation following a meeting of executives of the India-US Defence Policy Group before the end of February.—AFP