NEW DELHI, 28 February 2006 — Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh yesterday defended a proposed civilian nuclear deal with the United States ahead of a visit by the US president, telling Parliament it would not compromise the country’s atomic weapons program.
“No part of this process would affect or compromise our strategic (nuclear) program,” Manmohan told the legislature ahead of the visit by President George W. Bush starting tomorrow.
Rejecting US demand of putting safeguards on its indigenous Fast Breeder Program, Manmohan said: “India will ensure that no impediments are put in its research and development activities.”
Taking note that Indo-US negotiations were “currently at a delicate stage,” Manmohan said: “We have judged every proposal made by the US side on merits, but we remain firm in that the decision of what facilities may be identified as civilian will be made by India alone, and not by anyone else.”
Manmohan’s Congress party-led coalition has draw flak from allies and national security analysts over the agreement reached in Washington in July 2004.
The deal requires India, which has refused to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, to separate its nuclear program into military and civilian components with the later under international inspection.
Manmohan told Parliament the country would put about 65 percent of its listed nuclear power capacity under International Atomic Energy Agency safeguards.
A breeder reactor produces more fuel than it consumes and could be a source of supply for nuclear weapons. Local news reports said the United States has called for the program to be listed.
In exchange for safeguards the United States would work to change domestic and international laws so that India would be allowed to buy now-banned civilian nuclear technology.
Some domestic security analysts fear that placing too much of India’s nuclear program under international inspection could effectively cap its nuclear weapons program.
Proliferation experts in the United States however have expressed fears that the deal rewards India for testing nuclear weapons in May 1998 and could encourage countries such as Iran and North Korea to follow suit.
Meanwhile, US Ambassador David C. Mulford yesterday said that Washington was making “every effort” to reach a civil nuclear cooperation agreement with New Delhi by the time President Bush comes here.
“We are hoping that we can reach an agreement by the time of the president’s visit. And every effort is being made to do so,” Mulford told reporters at Roosevelt House.
“But if we don’t, we can keep negotiating later,” he added.
Mulford echoed Bush’s views, enunciated in an interview with Doordarshan, the official broadcaster, that was aired Sunday. “We’ve just got to continue to come up with an agreement that both of us can live with,” Bush had said.
