NEW DELHI, 27 July 2007 — A day after the Cabinet approved a landmark civilian nuclear cooperation accord with Washington, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh began talks with different political parties in a bid to to allay their apprehensions about the deal.

Manmohan held talks with senior Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) leaders former Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, Rajnath Singh, Jaswant Singh, Arun Shourie and former National Security Adviser Brajesh Mishra.

The BJP has been critical of any such agreement. Earlier this month, Vajpayee said: “Once the nuclear deal comes into effect, the (US) Hyde Act will ensure that India loses forever its option of conducting a nuclear test, even if any other country does so.”

Meanwhile, as the Indian government tries to allay the fears of nuclear deal critics, some legislators in Washington are concerned about India retaining this nuclear right.

A bipartisan group of US lawmakers warned on Wednesday that Congress could block the nuclear cooperation deal if it sidesteps safeguards to prevent military uses of the technology.

Twenty-three legislators sent a letter to President George W. Bush saying the so-called “123” operating agreement, which reportedly allows India to reprocess spent nuclear fuel, could end up violating US law. “The agreement for nuclear cooperation is subject to the approval of Congress, and any inconsistencies between the agreement and the relevant US laws will call congressional approval deeply into doubt,” said the letter from the 23 members of the House of Representatives.

Edward Markey, co-chairman of the House Bipartisan Task Force on Nonproliferation, sounded his own warning. “If the 123 agreement has been intentionally negotiated to sidestep or bypass the law and the will of Congress, final approval for this deal will be jeopardized,” Markey said.

Details of the agreement have been kept under wraps since it was finalized in Washington last week by senior officials of the two countries.

The nuclear deal was agreed upon by Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh two years ago to highlight strategic ties between the world’s two biggest democracies.

The Congress approved the deal in principle last year and a bill to that effect was signed into law by Bush, but there was a delay in finalizing the operating agreement, which has to be approved again by Congress. India has stood fast against accepting any curbs on its reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel.

India also wants assurances that Washington will continue to supply fuel for its atomic plants in the event New Delhi conducts further nuclear weapons tests.

Manmohan is expected to reveal the agreement’s text in the Parliament on Aug. 10, the first day of the monsoon session.

In another development, Australia said it is considering selling uranium to India.

Australia has the world’s largest known reserves of uranium and has been under pressure to sell the nuclear fuel to India since it agreed last year to supply rival Asian giant China.

But Australia has a policy of refusing to export uranium to countries which have not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and, while China is a signatory, India is not.

Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said Australia would consider changing its policy and selling uranium to India if New Delhi agreed, in its deal with the United States, to inspections and UN safeguards consistent with the NPT.

“In these circumstances it is a possibility that we would begin negotiations with India over supplying uranium to power stations which were subject to United Nations inspections and to the regime of the International Atomic Energy Agency,” he told reporters.

“It is still something that we are considering and we certainly will have to wait and see what the conclusion is of negotiations between India and America.”

Downer said India had no record of exporting nuclear weapons technology to other countries, and that the export of uranium could help the country grow its burgeoning economy.

Prime Minister John Howard is reported to be a strong supporter of the plan. But the proposal brought immediate criticism from some opposition parties and environmental group Greenpeace.