Washington, December 23, 2005 (ANI)

Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran concluded a whirlwind two-day visit to Washington on Friday during which he held a series of meetings with US President George W Bush administration officials with focus on cooperation on civilian nuclear technology between India and the US.

Expressing satisfaction on his visit and the progress made between the two countries, Saran said that Indian and the US felt that they had a solid foundation for taking their relations to a much higher level.

"I go back very satisfied with the progress that has been made in the relations between our two countries. We have achieved considerable advance in term of the implementation of the various understandings that were reached on July 18 and I believe that we have a very good foundation for taking our relations to a much higher level, said Saran.

Maintaining the Bush administration's diplomatic position on the talks, U.S. State Department Spokesman Sean McCormack, however, said that there were things that needed to be done on both the sides, India and the US in order to move civil nuclear issue forward.

"And we're working through a wide variety of different issues. One of those issues is the civil nuclear issue with the Indian Government. As I said yesterday, there are things that we need to do on our side and that on the Indian side there are things that they need to do in order to move that forward. On our side, we need to ask the Congress to change some laws," said McCormack.

McCormack further said that in order to do that, there were certain requirements that they had negotiated with the India and thing that India was going to do.

"One of those things is to come up with a plan to separate the civilian and the military nuclear programs in India. The Indian Government now is working on that plan, and when we have a plan that is able to be implemented in our view, then that's the point at which we would go to the Congress and ask for some changes in the laws," he added.

Saran, who began his visit with a well-attended session at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and later, went on for a series of meetings with Bush administration officials including U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, National Security Adviser Stephen Hadley, his counterpart the Commerce Department and the Defence Department and also, U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Nicholas Burns, stuck to his view that the meetings were very positive.

One critical meeting for Saran was with U.S. Senator Richard Lugar, the chairman of the U.S. Senate's Foreign Relations Committee. This panel is key to any changes in U.S. law, especially on international nuclear cooperation. Some analysts in Washington feel that the U.S. Congress will be far harder to convince than the White House. And, Senator Lugar has taken particular interest in the agreement, as he is one of the authors of the Nunn-Lugar Nuclear Threat Reduction Program - a program the Senator is trying to expand.

Lugar has expressed his scepticism about civilian nuclear cooperation in Congressional hearings, as have the members of the U.S. House of Representatives International Relations Committee. But Saran emerged out from his meeting with Lugar with a good feeling.

However, the details of the talks, especially on civilian nuclear cooperation were almost non-existent. U.S. State Department Spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters, "We'll see. It depends. Again, this depends on both sides. We'll see what the Indian side comes up with in terms of their plan. It has to be a plan that can be implemented in our view. And we're working through all of those issues with them. That's part of what Under Secretary Burns is doing as well as Under Secretary Joseph and others in -- as part of this visit with the Foreign Secretary."

And just as the U.S. State Department repeatedly insisted that there is no timeline for completion of the talks and that discussions are ongoing, Secretary Saran reiterated that all was positive in his Washington talks.

Saran insisted to reports that his visit was not just about civilian nuclear cooperation, that a large number of issues were discussed, many of which go back to the Joint Statement inked by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on July 18.

But, the hope is that this critical and carefully negotiated agreement on civilian nuclear cooperation will be completed before U.S. President George Bush and First Lady Laura Bush make an historic visit to the subcontinent in early 2006.