US experts for N-restrictions

WASHINGTON: US weapons experts are calling on the US Senate to tighten provisions of a landmark civilian nuclear deal with India despite warnings by New Delhi that it cannot accept any more restrictions.

The experts want legislation to have an up-front declaration that India has stopped production of fissile material — plutonium and highly enriched uranium — for nuclear weapons and an annual certification that the deal does not fuel New Delhi’s nuclear weapons program.

They also want measures prohibiting the United States from providing nuclear aid directly or through other suppliers to India if it breaks commitments made under a July 18, 2005 accord reached between US President George W Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

Singh has made clear that India would not accept any conditions that went beyond the agreement with Bush and a plan they endorsed in which New Delhi would have 14 of its 22 nuclear reactors placed under international safeguards.

India particularly does not want to accept any US moratorium on the production of fissile material. But the US weapons experts said the measures were necessary because India had not joined the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), a global accord to limit the spread of nuclear weapons. “In our view, these are responsible actions and steps the (US) Congress should take to ensure that the deal does not create what we would consider to be adverse and damaging proliferation problems,” Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association, said.

Kimball was among 17 experts who sent a joint letter to Senate on Tuesday with a set of recommendations ahead of a likely vote by the chamber on the nuclear deal this fall.

In July, the US House of Representatives adopted the deal only after ensuring that even after it is passed by the Senate and becomes law, the  nuclear cooperation agreement would come under full oversight authority by Congress. The House had demanded periodic reporting from President Bush on India’s compliance with key US objectives in the region as well as on issues of non-proliferation.

Bill Frist, the Republican leader in the Senate, is consulting with colleagues on when and how best to bring the legislation to the floor for debate and vote, his office said.  “It is something that he wants to get done this month,” Carolyn Weyforth,  spokeswoman for Frist, said. Congress will have to adjourn by October 6 ahead of key mid-term elections.

Despite Indian criticisms, excessive tinkering of the legislation at this stage carries the risk that the carefully crafted bill will lose the strong US bipartisan support it now enjoys, said Lisa Curtis of the Washington-based Heritage Foundation.