US-India Nuclear Deal Passes Major Hurdle

by Haider Rizvi

UNITED NATIONS - Disarmament groups and peace activists are urging Congress to reject the Bush administration's plan to send U.S. nuclear technology to India after the proposal gained the assent of an international monitoring body late last week.

"It will undermine the security of the American people and people everywhere, if Congress allows it to go through," said David Krieger, president of the Nuclear Age Peace Foundation, about the U.S.-India pact on nuclear technology.

On Friday, a global conglomerate of 45 nations that set the nuclear trade rules approved the U.S.-India nuclear deal by accepting New Delhi's assertion that its nuclear cooperation with the United States was aimed solely at expanding energy production.

But many independent policy analysts in Washington, DC are not as convinced and see the Bush administration's move as a fatal blow to international efforts aimed at preventing the spread of nuclear weapons.

"We are concerned about this deal," said Leanor Tomero of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, an policy think tank on Capitol Hill. "It sets a very dangerous precedent."

Like many others, Krieger and Tomero think the nuclear pact with India would undermine the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and encourage other countries to acquire nuclear weapons.

"[It] risks fueling a regional arms race with Pakistan, complicating negotiations over Iran, and unraveling the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty," said Robert Gard, chairman of the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, about the nuclear technology deal.

At the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) meeting held in Vienna last week, a small group of countries strongly opposed the deal, but eventually failed to sustain their dissent in the wake of intense diplomatic pressure from Washington.

The NSG is an international consortium that is responsible for monitoring and approving nuclear exports worldwide.

The resistance to the deal, according to observers, was led by six like-minded countries -- Austria, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, and Switzerland -- which stressed that India must accept certain conditions before starting the nuclear trade.

Those conditions would have required India to guarantee that it would not use the deal to expand its nuclear weapons-related activities. In response, top Indian officials assured delegates that their country was fully opposed to nuclear proliferation.

But for critics like Tomero and Krieger, that is hard to believe because, like two other nuclear armed states, Israel and Pakistan, India remains unwilling to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

"As one of only three countries that has never signed the NPT and by continuing to refuse to sign the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, India has shunned meaningful nonproliferation commitments," said Tomero.

"[It] may promote not only a possible arms race between India and Pakistan, but also [between] India and China," added John Boroughs of the New York-based Lawyers Committee for Nuclear Policy, in a recent interview with OneWorld.

In addition to calling for actions against the spread of nuclear weapons, the 1970 Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty also requires the five declared nuclear powers -- Britain, China, France, Russia, and the United States -- to engage in "good-faith negotiations" toward eliminating their nuclear stockpiles.

Analysts see the approval of the U.S.-India nuclear agreement as a gross violation of UN Security Council Resolution 1172, which prohibits the export of technology that could in any way "assist programs in India or Pakistan for nuclear weapons.''

The 1998 resolution was adopted with consensus soon after both India and Pakistan tested nuclear devices in defiance of international agreement against the spread of nuclear weapons.

Since the 1947 partition when the British ended their colonial rule in the Indian sub-continent, India and Pakistan have gone to war with each other three times. Currently, both countries are in possession of a sizeable arsenal of nuclear weapons.

According to the Uranium Resource Center, India has as many as 14 nuclear energy reactors in commercial operation and 9 under construction. Currently, its nuclear power supplies are estimated to account for about 3 percent of total electricity production.

Though India strongly denies that it intends to use the deal with the United States to expand its nuclear weapons program, its officials have also argued that the deal does not preclude the country from carrying out further nuclear tests.

Critics have described the U.S. acceptance of India's nuclear weapons program as amounting to ''a major concession'' for a country that has refused to join the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

But in reflecting on the consequences of the U.S.-India agreement and its approval by the Nuclear Suppliers Group, Tomero also held Russia and other major powers responsible for the breach of international rules governing the non-proliferation regime.

"The U.S. nuclear industry has pushed hard for this deal," she said. "[However], Japan, Russia, and France will also gain from this because they think more nuclear competition is profitable. I think the Congress will have to look at this very carefully."

Congress to Have Final Say

Observers say they expect the Bush administration will try hard to get the nuclear deal with India approved by Congress before the presidential polls are held in November.

"I think Berman will put on a lot of pressure," said Tomero, referring to Howard Berman, chairman of the House of Representatives foreign affairs committee. In a statement last Monday, Berman made it clear that any final agreement "must be consistent" with the 2006 Hyde Act, which calls for "immediate termination" of all nuclear trade by NSG members if India detonates a nuclear explosive device.

"Congress needs to study the NSG decision, along with any agreements that were made behind the scenes," said Berman. "If the administration wants to seek special procedures, it will have to show how the NSG decision is consistent with the Hyde Act."

"The burden of proof," according to Berman, "is on the Bush administration so that Congress can be assured that what we're being asked to approve conforms to U.S. law," he added in a statement.

Meanwhile, peace activists are stepping up their lobbying efforts on Capitol Hill, amid calls for voters to urge their Congressional representatives to take a firm stand against the nuclear trade deal with India.

"It's time for action," said Kreiger. "Other countries will be looking at this deal as a model that will serve their own interests as well. If the United States can do it with India, why not China with Pakistan? Or Russia with Iran? Or Pakistan with Syria?"