Friday, April 21 2006 15:26 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Washington: India and the US have agreed to respond to counter-terrorism assistance requests expeditiously and collaborate to upgrade preparedness and capability to deal with terrorism.

This was decided at the two-day meeting of the India-US Joint Working Group on Counter terrorim which ended today.

The two countries decided to advance cooperation in the areas of bio terrorism, aviation security, biometrics, cyber-security and terrorism, WMD-terrorism, terrorist finance and money laundering and violent extremism, a release issued by the Embassy of India said.

"Both sides agreed to share information on a real lime basis, respond to counter-terrorism assistance requests expeditiously and collaborate to upgrade preparedness andcapability to deal with acts of terrorism," it said.

It was the seventh meeting of the Joint Working Group, which was established in 2000. The Indian delegation was led by Ambassador K.C. Singh, Additional Secretary (International Organizations), Ministry of External Affairs. The U.S. delegation was led by Ambassador Henry Crumpton, Coordinator for Counter terrorism, at the State Department.

"Joint counter-terrorism exercises will be scheduled and specific training programs in priority areas developed. The delegations also focused on improving the current mechanisms for extradition and legal cooperation," the sources said.

It has been agreed that the next session of the Joint Working Group would be held in New Delhi later this year.