"This week's ministerial, hosted by my colleague (Commerce Minister) Anand Sharma, can be a very important step toward our goal of the successful completion of the Doha Round of negotiations," Kirk said in a teleconference with reporters on the eve of the crucial meeting.

"The only reason that we are meeting in India was that, based on our collective desire to say -- to have India play a more productive role than the Doha talks.  We worked with Minister Sharma to convince our colleagues to gather in Delhi for this important ministerial," Kirk said in response to a question.

Kirk said participants of the meeting jointly share a common objective and belief that completion of the Doha Round can be a key element to helping the world recover from this current economic crisis.

Responding to a question, Kirk said he has not received any commitment or assurance from Sharma that India will help in carrying the developing countries at the Doha Round.

"I have not been given any assurances from Minister Sharma nor have I sought any. I take him at his word, as I do all of the participants, that all of us are faithfully committed to working as diligently as we can, to see if we can't put ourselves in a position to allow Doha to come to a successful conclusion," he said.

While playing golf with Obama over the weekend, Kirk made the US President aware that he was going to be travelling to India, that they are moving forward with his and the directive of the other leaders at the recent G-8 summit in Italy to engage in the type of dialogues that would try to allow them to move Doha forward next year.