By Arun Kumar, IANS
Washington : As India and the United States released the text of the accord to implement their civil nuclear deal, Washington’s point man on the issue Nicholas Burns dismissed suggestions that it violates the spirit of the Hyde Act.
“That’s absolutely false,” said Burns, US Under Secretary of State, addressing concerns that US assurances to help India find other sources of fuel in the event of it conducting a nuclear weapons test would violate the spirit of the Hyde Act that approved the deal in principle.
The agreement preserved intact the responsibility of the president under the Atomic Energy Act of 1954 that if India or any other country conducts a nuclear test, the president will have the right to ask for the return of the nuclear fuel or nuclear technologies that have been transferred by American firms, he said.
“That right is preserved wholly in the agreement. We’re releasing the agreement on our website on Friday afternoon and people will see that when they cite the text,” Burns said in an interview with Council on Foreign Relations, a leading US think tank.
Asked if he saw enough movement in the US Congress that there might be a vote this autumn to approve the deal, Burns said, “We hope so.” But noted that two things have to happen before it goes back for a final vote in Congress.
“First, India has to conclude a safeguards agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which I expect will happen in the next 30 to 35 days.
“Secondly, the Indians will need to convince the Nuclear Suppliers Group – this is the group of 45 nuclear energy powers in the world – that it should give the same kind of international treatment in terms of civil nuclear trade to India that the United States would have just given bilaterally.
“Once those two steps are taken, then perhaps by November or December we’ll be ready to formally send this agreement to Capitol Hill for a final vote. We hope that vote will mirror the Hyde Act vote which was, of course, an overwhelming vote in favour of India and the United States by Congress,” Burns said.
Asked what safeguards had been provided to ensure that India would reprocess nuclear material only for civilian use, he said Washington had agreed to confer reprocessing consent rights, as it’s called, on the Indians because of two factors.
“Number one, the Indians offered and have now agreed to construct a state-of-the-art processing facility and all the foreign fuel shipped into India will go through that plant to be reprocessed. It will be fully safeguarded by the IAEA, fully transparent and monitored by the IAEA. That will give the entire international community an abundance of reassurance that there is no diversion to the weapons programme.
“Secondly, US law states that while we can promise reprocessing consent rights, we have to negotiate a subsequent agreement. We will do that and Congress will have the right to review that agreement,” the official said.
The deal would end India’s nuclear isolation and bring it more securely in line with global safeguards, said Burns. “I think it speaks to the modern-day needs of the Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) as well as what we need to do to strengthen it in the years ahead.”
Asked if the deal addressed US concerns that India would support efforts to press Iran to abandon its suspected nuclear weapons programme, Burns said it doesn’t speak of political issues in the text of the agreement as it was a technical agreement of the type that US has done with Japan, Russia, China, and the European Union in the past.
“But apart from that, we have been very actively involved in counselling the Indian government that they should remain with the rest of the international community in arguing to the Iranians that they should not become a nuclear weapons power, number one. And number two, we hope very much that India will not conclude any long-term oil and gas agreements with Iran,” Burns said.
“And so I trust the Indians will maintain this policy of not in any way, shape, or form assisting the Iranian government in its nuclear plans, and in giving the right advice to the Iranian government that we would expect any democratic country to give” he said, noting that the Indians had voted with US at the IAEA board of governors against Iran on two occasions.