Frank Pallone: “I agree with the gentleman. My understanding is that the Clinton Administration, as the gentleman said, supports…”

“I agree with the gentleman. My understanding is that the Clinton Administration, as the gentleman said, supports expansion to five seats: one for Germany, one for Japan, and then one each for Asia, Africa and Latin America. The Clinton Administration is not saying that the Asian seat should be India at this point, but we believe that it should be, and we are hoping that at some point we can get this administration and the State Department to agree that that Asian seat should belong to India. Mr. Speaker, I just wanted to say that we understand that this process of expanding the Security Council and gaining India access to one of the seats may take some time. It seems like to some extent it has been somewhat slowed down in 1998, but if it does not come up this year, it probably will come up again, and we are going to continue to make the fight that the United States should take the position that India be included as one of the permanent members; again, part of the process of stressing the importance of India not only in terms of the world but also in terms of our foreign policy.”