Agence France-Presse,
Editor Note: Such deals can only increase India's deterrent capacity and allow it to make more weapons of mass destruction, just like similar deal allowed India to make nuclear weapons in 1970s… which started off a nuclear arms race in Asia.
New Delhi: The landmark India-US nuclear pact will not hurt India's nuclear deterrent capacity or its national interests, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told parliament Tuesday. “The integrity of our nuclear doctrine and our ability to maintain a minimum credible nuclear deterrent is adequately protected,” Singh said He was seeking to allay opposition that the deal might cap India's military potential.
India's atomic establishment expressed fears the accord — the centrepiece of New Delhi's new relationship with Washington — could hurt the defence capacity of India, which has fought three wars with nuclear rival Pakistan.
The deal, struck last week during a visit by US President George W. Bush giving India access to long-denied civilian nuclear technology, still must be approved by the US Congress.
Under the accord, New Delhi will split its closely entwined civilian and military nuclear facilities and put 14 of its 22 nuclear reactors under international inspection by 2014.
“The separation plan will not adversely affect our strategic (military) programme,” Singh said, briefing parliament on the accord's details.
Uday Bhaskar, analyst at the New Delhi-based Institute of Defence Studies and Analysis, which is partly funded by the Indian military, agreed that the deal would not compromise India's strategic needs.
“This is adequate in keeping with India's strategic stance,” he said.
Singh added the pact ended years of “troubled relations” between India and the United States, which were on opposite sides of the fence during the Cold War.
At the same time, he added: “Our nuclear policy will continue to be guided by restraint and responsibility.”
He said India had decided to place under safeguards all future civilian thermal power reactors and civilian fast breeder reactors and added it would retain the “sole right” to determine which reactors are civilian.
“This means India will not be constrained in any way in building future nuclear facilities, whether civilian or military,” said Singh.
“The separation plan ensures adequacy of fissile material and other inputs to meet the current and future requirements of our strategic programme, based on our assessment of the threat scenario.”
US opponents say the deal abandons long-standing non-proliferation principles and will complicate efforts to curb the spread of atomic weapons elsewhere, such as in Iran and North Korea.
Critics have zeroed in on a provision allowing India to declare the fast-breeders out of reach of international inspectors. Such reactors theoretically “breed” more fuel than they use and could also be employed to develop nuclear weapons.
Singh said the fast-breeder programme was “at the research and development stage… (and) we do not wish to place any encumbrances on our fast-breeder programme.”
The pact, which also must be approved by the 44-member Nuclear Suppliers Group, would end three decades of isolation under which India was denied help for its civilian energy programme after it first tested a nuclear weapon and refused to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Analysts say Bush will face a tough sell to win the support of Congress for the deal.
Singh added the 40-megawatt CIRUS reactor from which experts say India has produced weapons-grade plutonium would be mothballed by 2010. The reactor, supplied by Canada under a 1956 accord, is located at the state-owned Bhabha Atomic Research Centre outside Mumbai.
“We've decided to take these steps rather than follow intrusive inspections in a nuclear facility of high national security importance,” Singh said.
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