By IANS
New Delhi : Japan, a key member of the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), is “carefully examining” the Indo-US civil nuclear deal and Tokyo’s “position on this matter has been one of non-decision till now”, a Japanese official said Wednesday.
Japan’s indecision is mainly on account of the fact that India has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), Japan’s foreign ministry spokesman Mitsuo Sakaba said, briefing reporters on Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s India visit.
Abe is on a three-day visit, beginning Tuesday, that will also take him to Kolkata Thursday.
“That (not signing the treaty) is a unique position. So it is a sensitive aspect that we have to analyse. Therefore we have taken no stand so far,” Sakaba said. “But India has a good track record without signing the NPT,” he added.
“We are carefully examining it. Our position on this matter has been one of non-decision till now,” he said, referring to the nuclear deal that seeks to open up the doors for nuclear commerce for India after a gap of three decades.
“I hope you understand the sensitivity of the nuclear issue because of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. That is why we are examining the bilateral agreement carefully,” he said.
Japan is emotive over the nuclear issue following the horrors of the two atomic bombs that Allied Forces dropped on these small towns during the Second World War that killed tens of thousands of people.