During a bilateral meeting between Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his Japanese counterpart Junichiro Koizumi, the Indian side also decided to continue their collective effort in seeking a seat on the UN Security Council.

The meeting was among the three bilateral engagements Manmohan Singh had Monday on the margins of the 10th Summit of the Association of South-East Asian Nations (ASEAN) that was opened by Lao Prime Minister Bounnhang Vorachith.

The other two meetings were with the president of the host nation, Khamtay Siphandone, on whom he called at the presidential palace, and Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong of Singapore.

Briefing reporters, Rajiv Sikri, secretary (east) in India's external affairs ministry, said during the meeting with the Japanese premier, Manmohan Singh had said that an "arc of advantage" existed in Asia that needed to be tapped.

To this Koizumi responded saying while the Western world only saw an "arc of instability" in this part of the world, there existed an "arc of prosperity" waiting to be tapped.

He also told Singh that India was now a focus of international attention because of its economic development and that Japan was watching India with keen interest.

The Indian prime minister, nevertheless, said that much more needed to be done to tap the potential between the two countries, adding there were more Japanese investors in Mumbai in 1975 than in the whole of India today.

Accordingly, the two sides decided to set up a joint study group that would look into all aspects of trade, economic and investment cooperation and suggest how the two countries should move forward in that direction.

The two sides also decided to continue working together in securing a permanent seat in the UN Security Council for India, Japan, Germany and Brazil - a process the leaders of the four countries had initiated in New York in September.

In the "brief" meeting with the Singapore leader, Manmohan Singh formally extended an invitation for former prime minister and the present incumbent's father, Lee Kuan Yew, to address the next Jawaharlal Nehru Memorial Lecture.

He said Singapore was India's gateway to other ASEAN nations and said some 1,400 Indian companies had a presence in Singapore, many of them in the information technology sector.

The two leaders also agreed that the negotiations on the proposed comprehensive economic and investment cooperation agreement was progressing well and hoped to sign the pact early next year. A need was also felt to intensify high-level visits to each other's countries.

In his meeting with the Lao president, Manmohan Singh said India would continue to assist the landlocked country in its development and thanked the role played by Vientiane in projecting India's position in ASEAN.

--Indo-Asian News Service