Is India re-writing nuclear history?

[Clearly India is standing by its story that it developed The Bomb as a "peaceful explosive"--hence the need to see the boycott of nuclear trade with India as an "historical anomaly" which needs "correcting." No doubt that is why India has developed ballistic missiles and is in the market for nuclear submarines. No longer is that development to be understood as secretive and dishonest. On the contrary, India's ambassador to the US expects his country to be seen as "a proponent and adherent of nuclear non-proliferation." Not to worry then, because "India's system of controls over nuclear material, equipment and technology were perhaps the most effective in the world." Perhaps? Witness how folklore becomes the only likely repository of the truth. It's not The Bomb that worries me nearly as much as India's obvious aspirations as yet another global warrior. -jlt]

"N-deal an Indo-US effort to end nuke isolation," Sify, April 19, 2008.

Washington: India and the US are working together to correct the "historical anomaly" of New Delhi being treated as a target of international instruments to prevent proliferation of nuclear weapons, says the Indian ambassador in Washington.

"For too long, India, a proponent and adherent of nuclear non-proliferation, itself was treated as a target of international instruments to prevent proliferation of nuclear weapons and their delivery systems," Ambassador Ronen Sen said on Thursday.

This was "notwithstanding the fact that India's system of controls over nuclear material, equipment and technology were perhaps the most effective in the world," he said in a keynote address at a conference on Future Direction of India's Foreign Policy. The Centre for Advanced Study of India (CASI) of the University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia organised the conference.

"We are now engaged in a major endeavour, primarily in cooperation with the United States, on correcting this historical anomaly," said Sen, apparently alluding to the stalled India-US civil nuclear deal, which would allow India to resume nuclear commerce after a gap of thirty years.

Once it goes through, the landmark deal would bring India into the mainstream of international non-proliferation with New Delhi entering into an India-specific safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) changing its guidelines for global nuclear trade.

The deal, which would go to the US Congress only after it gets the nod from IAEA and the NSG, has been stalled due to opposition from the Left parties.

Besides the nuclear deal, the envoy noted that during the last three and a half years of his current assignment he had witnessed "the irrevocable transformation of our relations with the United States."

For more news, analysis click here>> | For more Political news click here >>

"In addition to the rapid growth of two-way trade and investment, cooperation in education and science and technology, the governments in both countries have invested significant political capital in building a strategic partnership based on shared values and common concerns.

"India-US relations encompass the most wide-ranging engagement that India has with any country today," Sen said.

[...]

Read the rest of the article =>

See Sify's coverage of the Indo-US nuclear deal =>Recommend this Post

Sphere: Related Content