Last high-profile trip to India by Biden administration will focus on technology

US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan will travel to India for a visit focusing on cooperation on strategic technology, including in defense, space and artificial intelligence. The Biden administration said Sullivan’s visit on Sunday and Monday will include a speech at the Indian Institute of Technology in New Delhi in which he will stress that the outgoing administration sees the US partnership with India as central to its regional and global priorities, and one with support from both major political parties. It’s expected to be the last high-profile visit to India by the Biden administration. Sullivan is expected to meet with Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval and Indian External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar.

India and the US launched a technology initiative in 2022 outlining collaboration on semiconductor production and developing artificial intelligence. The accord was critical in sealing a deal to allow US-based General Electric to partner with India’s Hindustan Aeronautics to produce jet engines in India.

India and the US have grown closer recently, in part in response to China’s growing assertiveness in the Indo-Pacific region. Biden threw Prime Minister Narendra Modi a state dinner last year.

But ties have also been strained by US prosecutors’ accusation in 2023 that an official in Modi’s government was involved in a foiled assassination plot against an activist of India’s Sikh minority in New York, and the killing of another Sikh activist in Canada.