India, US talking Export curbs on High-Tech items: FM.

WASHINGTON: Union Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Sunday said India has taken up with the US the issue of export control in high-technology trade, and pressed for a number of Indian units to be removed from its restricted Entity List.

Speaking to media persons at the conclusion of his three-day trip to Washington where he attended the bi-annual meetings of the IMF and the World Bank , Mukherjee expressed satisfaction over the overall progress in Indo-US defence ties.

But, he pointed out, that the issue of export control was an area where more movement is needed. "... it is one area where we do feel that a number of Indian units which are in their entity list should be removed from the list, we are talking export control also, we are in the process of dialogue," Mukherjee said.

The Finance Minister said India and the US had come "much closer" both economically and politically as well as in the field of defence in the last few years.

"... some major instruments which have been signed during this period, take the case of defence, which we never contemplated of having any cooperation in the defence sector, but when I was defence minister, we signed defence framework co-operation, on the basis of which now on Government to government FMS route defence exchanges are taking place, we are talking...," he said.

The US Department of Commerce's Entity List contains a list of foreign end users which might have proliferation concerns. The list is aimed at assisting exporters in determining whether an entity poses proliferation concerns.

Source : economictimes.indiatimes.com