INDIA: President Bush last night cast his strategic partnership with India as one between natural allies that has the "power to transform the world", in an attempt to sell his foreign policy shift to critics at home and abroad.
The US president, standing on the ramparts of a 16th-century Mughal fort in New Delhi, spoke of being "dazzled" by India, which his nation was bound to by a common desire for freedom and democracy. "We are brothers in the cause of human liberty," he told a 300-strong audience of the Indian capital's elite.
Seeking to assuage wider Indian concerns about his visit to Pakistan, where he arrived late last night, Mr Bush said the day had passed when India should be worried about Washington's ties with Islamabad. Mr Bush made a strong pitch for India to become a fully fledged partner in the war on terror. He pointed out that it too has suffered from terrorism that could "bring down all the progress" India had made.
He emphasised that in a world "hungry for freedom" India's leadership was needed for the people of "North Korea to Burma to Syria to Zimbabwe to Cuba" and took a swipe at the "clerical elite" in Iran which "sponsors terrorism and pursues nuclear weapons".
The US president has charmed the Indian media with his praise for the country. But this has not impressed tens of thousands of Muslims and left-wing activists who again took to the streets chanting anti-Bush slogans. Three people were killed in clashes in northern India.
Mr Bush showed a deft political touch with his Delhi audience: name-dropping India's current tennis star, Sania Mirza, and its film capital Bollywood, and recalling the Indian-born astronaut who died on a shuttle explosion three years ago.
America's interest in India has been sparked largely by the developing country's technological expertise that has seen jobs shift eastward to India's southern Silicon Plateau. This has helped swell India's middle class by tens of millions of people - potential consumers of US goods.
Spending most of the day in the southern city of Hyderabad, home to many high-tech US firms, Mr Bush again displayed a common touch, meeting young business school graduates, farmers - and a buffalo.
Meanwhile, a nationwide strike called by Islamist parties paralysed Pakistan yesterday hours before Mr Bush arrived for talks in which he is expected to urge greater efforts against Islamist militants.
Mr Bush flew in with his wife, Laura, aboard Air Force One to a military airbase near Islamabad. His visit, which comes a day after a suicide car bomber killed an American diplomat and two other people in Karachi, has angered Islamists opposed to the US-led war on terrorism and President Pervez Musharraf's support for the campaign.
Additional reporting: Reuters