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Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is due in Japan to seek support from the major civilian atomic power for the controversial US-India nuclear cooperation pact.
Singh, the first Indian premier here in five years, can expect a red-carpet reception as Japan seeks warmer relations with a fellow Asian democracy to counter frequent tension with China.
But despite the good feelings, Japanese leaders appear divided on one of Singh's signature foreign policy feats — his deal with US President George W. Bush to bring India out of the nuclear wilderness.
Under the pact, the United States would export nuclear fuel and technology to India which would put its civilian-use reactors under outside scrutiny.
The deal needs to be approved by the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group, which controls the movement of nuclear material and was set up to exclude India after its first atomic test in 1974.
Japan is the only nation to have been attacked with nuclear bombs and also one of the biggest producers of atomic energy, a paradox that may let it hold the keys to India's entrance into the global civilian nuclear club.
A foreign ministry official said Japan would wait for Singh's explanations during the four-day visit.
He said there “still remain many issues to be worked out” including the final shape of the US-India nuclear treaty and the nature of safeguards on Indian facilities by the International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN watchdog.
“We should wait for these developments before Japan can define its own positions,” he said on condition of anonymity.
The pact still faces widespread accusations in India that it is too intrusive. The criticism comes both from Singh's leftist allies and the Hindu nationalist opposition — which while in power in 1998 declared India a nuclear power with bomb tests that were replicated by rival neighbor Pakistan.
However, the US Congress passed the deal by an overwhelming margin last week despite concern by some lawmakers that it set a bad example to aspiring nuclear powers such as Iran, as India has not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
For Japan, the nuclear taboo has eased since October when arch-enemy North Korea tested an atom bomb. Two top politicians have called for Tokyo to consider developing atomic weapons itself.
Japanese politicians remain deeply divided on the Indian nuclear pact, said Takako Hirose, a South Asia expert at Tokyo's Senshu University.
“On the one hand, there are the people who say that we should at least publicly approve of the pact and then Japanese firms can also benefit,” she said. “But there are some people who are sort of NPT fundamentalists.”
Complicating the debate is China, whose rise on the world stage causes jitters in many quarters in both India and Japan.
To India's surprise, Chinese President Hu Jintao sounded upbeat about civilian nuclear cooperation when he paid a rare visit to New Delhi last month.
His stance may be part of Beijing's strategy to assuage regional concerns as it seeks a global role. India had initially feared that China would prevent it from joining the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
“Now it seems that if other countries like Japan want to block it, China may follow. But China will not be the only country to block it,” said Hirose, who recently spoke with policymakers in New Delhi.
Japan's blessing for the nuclear deal would also be face-saving for Singh, who faces domestic criticism that he is aligning proudly independent India too closely with Washington.
“This government is committed to what they call a multipolar world,” said Kamal Mitra Chenoy, a professor at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi.
“Japan would be an obvious goalpost that they would like to move to and try to broadbase their relationships,” he said.
