ALMA ATA, April 26 (Xinhua) -- Uzbek President Islam Karimov and the visiting Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Wednesday made a commitment to strengthen energy collaboration between their two countries, according to reports from the capital city of Tashkent.

    Uzbekistan was ready to sign energy deals with India on an equal footing, Karimov said at a news conference in the capital city, Tashkent, after talks with Singh about the prospects of developing potential energy sources in Uzbekistan cooperatively.

    "We are ready to provide India with geological territory with oil and gas, hydrocarbon reserves... to be explored and developed on the basis of a fifty-fifty production sharing agreement," Karimov added.

    Singh said Uzbekistan was an important country in the Central Asian region for the development of energy resources, adding that India was very happy that "we have agreed to cooperate in the fields of oil and natural gas exploration and production."

    They also discussed issues concerning the fight against terrorism and illegal drug trafficking.

    The two countries signed a number of agreements to strengthen their cooperation in the fields of energy, agriculture, information technology and textiles. Enditem