The next American administration must shift from a U.S. preoccupation with the Middle East to devote more attention to Asia and the rise of China and India, a major report said on Wednesday.

The nonpartisan Asia Foundation, in a new quadrennial study of the U.S. role in Asia, said President George W. Bush's successor in the White House must shift from responding to crises to anticipating and shaping major developments.

"While the United States has been preoccupied with the situation in the Middle East, the Asian balance has been shifting quietly, if inexorably, in the direction of others," said the report, crafted by 20 senior U.S. and Asian experts.

The 310-page report was delivered to the policy teams of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama and Republican rival John McCain.

Retired U.S. diplomat J. Stapleton Roy, one of the leaders of the project, said Washington since the Sept. 11 attacks often has focused "on the urgent at the expense of the important" and needs a new approach in light of the rise of China and India.

"The perception of Asians is that we are not as engaged as we were in the past and we are not as engaged as we should be," said Roy, vice chairman of Kissinger International Associates.

The San Francisco-based foundation said the United States faces a "triple challenge: getting our own house in order, defining with greater clarity a geopolitical strategy for Asia, and promoting concerted efforts among Asian powers to cope with pressing transnational problems."