Sachin Kalbag & Uttara Choudhury
WASHINGTON/NEW YORK: At a time when India is close to inking a civilian nuclear agreement with the United States, a Washington-based think tank has warned of escalating proliferation in South Asia.
The Institute for Science and International Security (ISIS) has published an investigation of Pakistan’s Khushab reactor, claiming it has the potential to build up to 50 bombs a year.
Although the release of the report appears to have been calibrated to scuttle the deal, observers do not impute it with any value to damage India’s interests.
“The timing of the report is interesting, but I won’t go so far as to say that it will directly impact the Indian nuclear deal,” said Fredric Grare from the Washington-based Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Further reassurance comes from Tom Lantos, ranking member of the House International Relations Committee and co-author of the House version of the nuclear agreement bill.
He told DNA: “I don’t believe the five-year-old Pakistani reactor development programme will have any effect on passage of our legislation this week. Pakistan’s newly disclosed reach for more plutonium does not change the safeguards in the US-India deal; it makes them all the more relevant.”
The Khushab investigation was led by ISIS founder and former International Atomic Energy Agency inspector David Albright.
