New Delhi, October 30
The United States today expressed optimism over the operationalisation of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal, while pointing that the democratic processes in India need to work to come to a conclusion on it.

“The United States values the fact that India is a vibrant democracy and democratic processes need to work to come to a conclusion on the deal,” US treasury secretary Henry S Paulson said while replying to questions on the nuclear deal at the Fortune Global Forum meeting here.

“I am an optimist. I think good ideas automatically get done,” he said pointing that it was important to get the civil nuclear deal implemented as soon as possible because it would be good for India’s energy security and infrastructure. Paulson asserted that the bilateral relations with India were never so good in the past as it is now.

On the sub-prime crisis in the US, he said it was too early to call an end to the housing slump. “The US government is still trying to assess as to what went wrong in the sub-prime crisis, particularly focussing on the role of credit agencies and accounting rules related to structured investment vehicles,” he said.

“While markets will take a while to work through the fallout of the sub-prime crisis, they are doing better everyday,” he added.

Washington, October 30
Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has conveyed to her Indian counterpart Pranab Mukherjee that the Bush Administration continues to support the US-India civil nuclear agreement,urging New Delhi to move forward on the landmark deal.

Rice conveyed this message in a telephonic conversation with Mukherjee yesterday.

Later, State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said, ''She wanted to underline and reinforce for the Indian Government that we continue to support moving forward with the agreement.''He, however, said ''It was made clear that the resolution to the political discussions [on the deal] within India are for the Indian political system to resolve.''

On being probed further on anything else he thought could be done to try to help with this process, McCormack said, ''At this point, I believe it's really a matter for the Indian political system to resolve. There are questions about it in -- and whatever that resolution is, it's going to be up to them; however they have to decide -- whichever way they want to go”.

Asked whether Secretary Rice was still hopeful of the deal, the spokesman said, ''She still supports it going forward.''

''We have conveyed that to the Indian Government at a number of different levels.They're working through some domestic politics. I know that there is an intense debate within India right now concerning the civil nuclear deal (proposed civil nuclear deal with the United States).''

''The Indian people and the Indian political system are going to have to work out whatever resolution of that debate there will be. But we continued to urge the Indian Government to move forward with this deal and we are prepared to move forward with it as well,'' McCormack added. — UNI