India closely watching US withdrwal from Afghanistan: Tewari

India is closely watching withdrawal of the United States-led troops from Afghanistan as this will have implications on the region as well the neighbours of the war-torn country, Union Minister Manish Tewari today said.

"As the United States is winding down engagement in Afghanistan in 2014, possibly the Indo-Afghan dimension is going to be the central piece for not only India but also the entire region.

"The impact of the withdrawal in Afghanistan will be watched closely because to an extent it will have bearing on a relationship India has with its immediate neighbours and how will they view this," Tewari said referring to Pakistan.

The Minister for Information and Broadcasting was speaking at a release of report on "Beyond the Plateau in US-India Relations" at Observer Research Foundation (ORF) here.
He said the "breakthrough" in the Iran nuclear issue will also help bring stability to the region.

The minister noted that contrary to belief that the relations between the two nations had slumped after signing of the Indo-US nuclear deal, it had, in fact, reached a certain degree of stability and familarity with each other's position.

Describing the evolution of relations between the two nations from "strained democracies" to "engaged democracies", Tewari said the Indo-US nuclear deal helped lift the relations to a new level.

"The Indo-US nuclear deal helped in lifitng foreign policy from the clustered defines of the very esoteric debates by experts and brought it out in to the public realm.

"We have been able to alleviate our relationship by calling each other a close strategic partner," Tewari said.