WASHINGTON: A landmark agreement on civilian nuclear cooperation between India and the United States faced a new obstacle in the US Senate yesterday but saw progress in the House of Representatives.
The agreement looked stalled in the Senate after at least one lawmaker anonymously blocked a bill to approve the deal from reaching a vote, according to congressional aides, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to brief reporters.
The bill’s prospects had improved late Thursday after an intervention by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who spoke with the powerful chairman of the House of Representatives’ Foreign Affairs Committee, Democratic Rep. Howard Berman. After they talked, Berman replaced a bill that was at odds with the Senate counterpart with a matching version.
Berman urged his colleagues to support the accord, which the House was scheduled to debate yesterday. But time is running short as lawmakers prepare to wrap up this year’s session within days to campaign for November’s elections.
The Senate must pass an identical version to the House, and the procedural snag represented a significant hurdle to its passage. Explaining his decision to adopt the Senate version, Berman said in a statement that Rice had, “in a change of policy,” made a personal commitment that the United States, at a November meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group of countries that supply nuclear material, would work to secure a prohibition on exporting sensitive nuclear enrichment and reprocessing equipment to countries that haven’t signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
It was unclear whether there will be a vote in the Senate, where a single senator can use a procedural maneuver to prevent legislation from passing. Five Democratic lawmakers wrote to Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid this month expressing their opposition to the bill.
The setback in the Senate came after Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh tried to rally support in a Washington visit and White House meeting with President George W. Bush. The Bush administration considers the deal a top foreign policy goal.
The pact would allow the US to sell nuclear materials to a country that has tested nuclear weapons but has refused to sign international treaties designed to limit the illicit spread of such materials.
On Thursday night, Bush assured Singh that his administration was working to get prompt congressional approval on the deal. “It’s taken a lot of work on both our parts, a lot of courage on your part,” Bush said. “And so we’re working hard to get it passed as quickly as possible.”
Singh arrived in Washington for the White House meeting on Thursday after attending the UN General Assembly in New York, and just as Congress has taken up the historic agreement that has been at the forefront of Bush’s foreign policy agenda as be prepares to leave office in January.
“I sincerely hope that this agreement ... will be approved in a manner which will be satisfactory from the point of view of both our countries,” Singh said.
The Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Tuesday overwhelmingly approved the deal, which still must go to the full chamber. The House of Representatives was expected to take up the measure yesterday.
With the congressional session nearing an end in the coming days, Bush urged lawmakers to quickly debate and approve the nuclear agreement first signed by the two leaders in 2006. Since then, the two countries have been in complicated negotiations to implement the agreement, pending congressional approval.
