President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (l) talks with Indian Premier Manmohan Singh in New Delhi on Tuesday.

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad met his Indian counterpart Pratibha Patil at the Presidential Palace in New Delhi on Tuesday.
The two presidents discussed the latest developments in bilateral relations and regional and international issues, IRNA reported.
In the first visit by an Iranian head of state to India in five years, Ahmadinejad referred to understanding between the governments and the people of India and Iran, expressing the hope that the centuries-old relations between the two nations would further strengthen in future.
Also on Tuesday, Ahmadinejad met Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at his residence.
The two sides discussed the latest situation in the standoff between Iran and the West over Tehran’s peaceful nuclear program.
Last week, India curtly told the US not to interfere in its dealings with Iran after a State Department spokesman said Washington would like New Delhi to put pressure on Ahmadinejad over his country’s nuclear program.
India’s stand was met with approval by Tehran, earlier angered by India’s votes against it at the International Atomic Energy Agency and India’s commercial launch of an Israeli spy satellite in January.
The Iranian president arrived in India on his first official visit to try to seal a $7.6-billion pipeline deal linking the world’s second-largest gas reserves to growing South Asian economies.
Ahmadinejad visited Pakistan on Monday before moving on to Sri Lanka. Islamabad and Tehran said they had settled a host of issues over the pipeline project, which could be completed by 2012.
It would initially transport 60 million cubic meters of gas (2.2 billion cubic feet) daily to Pakistan and India, half for each country, but capacity would be raised later to 150 million cubic meters.
New Delhi also wants to revive a 2005 agreement to import 5 million tons of liquefied natural gas from Iran.
India has been boycotting trilateral meetings on the Iran pipeline since mid-2007, citing it first wanted to resolve the issues of transit fees and transportation tariffs with Pakistan.
Earlier, Ahmadinejad launched a project to boost the capacity of Sri Lanka’s main oil refinery, part of a $1.5 billion loan to the government as Iran extends its energy ties in South Asia.
“We can ensure security and fair play for all...but in the world some powerful nations do not allow such a situation and they have created divisions among people and nationalities,“ Ahmadinejad said at the launch in remarks through an interpreter.
“The peoples of Sri Lanka and Iran are against the policies of states that are the enemies of humanity.“
Iran had pledged a $1.5 billion loan to fund a raft of infrastructure projects in Sri Lanka, including a deal to boost oil refinery capacity and a 100-megawatt hydropower project.
The project aims to boost production of Sri Lanka’s Sapugaskanda Oil Refinery in Colombo from 50,000 barrels per day to 100,000 bpd.
The visiting president is accompanied by Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki, Commerce Minister Massoud Mir Kazemi, Chairman of Iran’s Cultural Heritage, Handicrafts and Tourism Organization Esfandiar Rahim Mashaei and senior adviser to the president, Mojtaba Samareh Hashemi.

In the context of its latest foreign policy initiative, the Islamic Republic of Iran will soon send to the so-called 5+1 Group a political proposal package to help address security concerns in the region.
Details of the rare proposal are still not clear. However, according to the Secretary of the Supreme National Security Council, Saeed Jalili, it contains several plans to help restore sustainable peace and security meaningful dialogue.
The top security official has been quoted as saying Iran’s “nuclear issue can be an important topic of discussion among the big powers, and Iran is ready to present serious proposals to this end.“
Observers opine that the package of proposals by Iran shows the innovative skills and broad vision of the foreign policy apparatus.
In recent years it had become a rather strange habit that all important proposals to solve the non-ending problems of the world would come from the West in the form of nuclear incentives. The same has been true vis-ˆ-vis Iran’s nuclear program and how to settle the ongoing “dispute“.
Based on the carrot and stick policy, the United States and Europe have provided Iran with several proposals to stop and reverse its civilian nuclear program. In exchange Tehran has been offered a “package of incentives“ that ostensibly addresses our major security concerns, makes available western economic and technological assistance, and promises effective support for the nuclear program to produce electricity.
Simultaneous to the carrot, the US-led western powers are also showing the stick in a bid to intimidate the nation and convey that they will not accept a nuclear Iran.
With this raw intention, the West is resorted to serious pressure tactics, sent the nuclear case to the UN Security Council and used its “law-of-the-jungle “approach to impose economic and political sanctions.
It is more than apparent that such push and pull tactics have not been able to compel Iran to change course or fall in line with illegal and unreasonable demands by governments whose past records speak volumes.
Needless to say, Iran has dismissed both the carrots and the sticks on the premise that it has not done anything illegal and the entirety of its nuclear program, including uranium enrichment, is being pursued under close IAEA inspections.
Tehran has taken the package initiative at a time when the western media has admitted that the US and its allies are no more in a position to push the Islamic state, and that the nuclear issue has reached a cul-de-sac.
Western powers and their advisers now have to see the ground realities, one of which is that there can no more be something for nothing. The times when arrogant powers, with loose morals and a long history of crime and corruption did the talking and others listened are over.
As Iran builds and moves forward pragmatically, it has once and for all decided to never again sit in the chair of the accused and be forced to respond to western nonsense and ambiguities. It has taken the initiative and will perform in a manner compatible with its status, both in the region and beyond.

Secretary of Supreme National Security Council Saeed Jalili and Swiss Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey discussed over phone on Tuesday Iran’s constructive proposal package on settlement of regional and international problems.
Welcoming Iran’s proposal package that partly covers global issues, the Swiss foreign minister voiced satisfaction over her talks with Iran, IRNA reported.
On April 13, Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki announced that Iran is preparing a package to help resolve the regional and international problems.
Referring to her recent meeting with IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei, Calmy-Rey termed continued cooperation between Iran and IAEA as “constructive and positive“.
Jalili, for his part, thanked Switzerland for its stands on international developments.
During the telephone conversation, the two sides agreed to continue their cooperation on regional and international developments.
on Monday Jalili said he discussed Tehran’s proposed package with the visiting senior Russian official.
Jalili said Iran will disclose the proposed package soon and exchange views with “influential states“ about it.
He said Iran’s proposed package could be the topic of Iranian talks with big powers or Group 5+1, which include five permanent members of the UN Security Council plus Germany.
Asked if Tehran will discuss its proposed package with Group 5+1, the top nuclear negotiator said, “We can also talk to them on this issue.“