Earlier this year, Sullivan had called off planned visits to India twice because of the US administration’s preoccupation with the Israel-Hamas conflict

US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan Begins Two Day Visit To India

In the first trip to India by a senior American official after the Modi government came to power for the third term, US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan will be in New Delhi on Monday for the second meeting of the initiative on Critical and Emerging Technologies (iCET). Sullivan was scheduled to visit India earlier in February but due to other pressing commitments in the US, the annual review meeting was rescheduled for June 17-18.

US National Security Adviser Sullivan is also scheduled to meet his Indian counterpart Ajit Doval. This meeting will be followed by a joint statement between the two nations underscoring the progress made and the importance of the iCET mechanism for the two countries.

Jaishankar said in a post on X after his meeting with Sullivan that the two sides had a “comprehensive discussion on a broad range of bilateral, regional and global issues”. He didn’t give details.

“Confident that India-US strategic partnership will continue to advance strongly in our new term,” Jaishankar said, referring to the new coalition government formed after the recent general election.

What is the iCET

The iCET was announced by India and the US in May 2022 and was officially launched in January 2023 and is being run by the National Security Council of both countries. Under iCET, both countries have identified six areas of cooperation which would include co-development and co-production, that would gradually be expanded to QUAD, then to NATO, followed by Europe and the rest of the world.

Under iCET, India is ready to share its core technologies with the US and expects Washington to do the same.

It aims to promote collaboration in critical and emerging technology areas, including AI, quantum computing, semiconductors, and wireless telecommunication.

Focus Areas of the Initiative

AI research agency partnership.

Defense industrial cooperation, defense technological cooperation, and defense startups.

Innovation Ecosystems.

Semiconductor ecosystem development.

Cooperation on human spaceflight.

Advancement in 5G and 6G technologies, and adoption of OpenRAN network technology in India.