09-08-2008, 01:01 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>A crippling deal </b>
The Pioneer Edit Desk
India now joins nuclear have-nots
<b>The officially-sponsored celebrations of India's so-called 'victory' in Vienna and the amazing presentation of crude propaganda, meant to whitewash the Prime Minister's deceitful role in compromising the nation's interests, as 'facts' by a section of the media, which has clearly parted company with all notions of free and fair reportage, cannot hide the simple truth:</b> We have lost our sovereign right to chart an independent nuclear policy, of which strategic deterrence is an important component. If prior to the July 18, 2005 joint statement, which was issued after Mr Manmohan Singh's meeting with President George W Bush, we were seen as a nuclear weapons state, today that status has been scornfully denied to us, courtesy the Prime Minister's unseemly haste to conclude the India-US nuclear agreement before he and Mr Bush exit office. No less unseemly has been Mr Singh's consistent efforts to mislead the nation through half-truths and untruths. As a result, India has been forced to pay a heavy price; we and future generations will continue to pay a heavier price. This severely blotted deal is not about "full civil nuclear energy cooperation" or India acquiring "the same benefits and advantages" as the US. It is about India being made to mortgage its sovereign right to a cartel that sways to America's tune; it is about sacrificing our strategic nuclear programme at the altar of perverse non-proliferation that denies India its rightful place at the high table of the the nuclear haves. With the adoption of the neither 'clean' nor 'unconditional' waiver agreement, drafted by the US to promote American interests and suppress Indian aspirations, the NSG has formally pushed India into the ranks of non-nuclear weapons states; worse, it has deftly converted our voluntary moratorium on further nuclear tests into a legally-binding multilateral obligation.
The Prime Minister's many declarations, all of them bereft of truth, now lie in tatters. His promised "removal of restrictions on all aspects of cooperation and technology transfers pertaining to civil nuclear energy" is not happening. His pledge to undertake "the same responsibilities and obligations" and "expect the same rights and benefits" as the US has turned out to be bogus. That he should describe the sellout as a "forward looking and momentous decision" does not come as a surprise -- his triumph is the nation's defeat. After Saturday, India has been straitjacketed by non-proliferation regimes whose real purpose is to perpetuate the divide between the nuclear haves and the nuclear have-nots. Worse, by allowing the US to craftily link, with the Prime Minister's approval, exports to India to mandatory compliance with Part 1 and Part 2 of the NSG Guidelines, every word and action will now be put under close scrutiny; if it suits the interests of the US, they will be seized upon for punitive action. This also restricts India's options: Paragraph 4(e) of Part 2 of the NSG Guidelines asserts that a supplier-state must first consider, before making any transfer, "Whether governmental actions, statements, and policies of the recipient state are supportive of nuclear non-proliferation and whether the recipient state is in compliance with its international obligations in the field of non-proliferation." And while we have been forced into binding obligations and inspections in perpetuity, the Prime Minister has agreed to the US and its cartel dropping all pretence of assured fuel supplies. This way lies the path to making India dependent on the US. A path that others have taken only to regret it.
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The Pioneer Edit Desk
India now joins nuclear have-nots
<b>The officially-sponsored celebrations of India's so-called 'victory' in Vienna and the amazing presentation of crude propaganda, meant to whitewash the Prime Minister's deceitful role in compromising the nation's interests, as 'facts' by a section of the media, which has clearly parted company with all notions of free and fair reportage, cannot hide the simple truth:</b> We have lost our sovereign right to chart an independent nuclear policy, of which strategic deterrence is an important component. If prior to the July 18, 2005 joint statement, which was issued after Mr Manmohan Singh's meeting with President George W Bush, we were seen as a nuclear weapons state, today that status has been scornfully denied to us, courtesy the Prime Minister's unseemly haste to conclude the India-US nuclear agreement before he and Mr Bush exit office. No less unseemly has been Mr Singh's consistent efforts to mislead the nation through half-truths and untruths. As a result, India has been forced to pay a heavy price; we and future generations will continue to pay a heavier price. This severely blotted deal is not about "full civil nuclear energy cooperation" or India acquiring "the same benefits and advantages" as the US. It is about India being made to mortgage its sovereign right to a cartel that sways to America's tune; it is about sacrificing our strategic nuclear programme at the altar of perverse non-proliferation that denies India its rightful place at the high table of the the nuclear haves. With the adoption of the neither 'clean' nor 'unconditional' waiver agreement, drafted by the US to promote American interests and suppress Indian aspirations, the NSG has formally pushed India into the ranks of non-nuclear weapons states; worse, it has deftly converted our voluntary moratorium on further nuclear tests into a legally-binding multilateral obligation.
The Prime Minister's many declarations, all of them bereft of truth, now lie in tatters. His promised "removal of restrictions on all aspects of cooperation and technology transfers pertaining to civil nuclear energy" is not happening. His pledge to undertake "the same responsibilities and obligations" and "expect the same rights and benefits" as the US has turned out to be bogus. That he should describe the sellout as a "forward looking and momentous decision" does not come as a surprise -- his triumph is the nation's defeat. After Saturday, India has been straitjacketed by non-proliferation regimes whose real purpose is to perpetuate the divide between the nuclear haves and the nuclear have-nots. Worse, by allowing the US to craftily link, with the Prime Minister's approval, exports to India to mandatory compliance with Part 1 and Part 2 of the NSG Guidelines, every word and action will now be put under close scrutiny; if it suits the interests of the US, they will be seized upon for punitive action. This also restricts India's options: Paragraph 4(e) of Part 2 of the NSG Guidelines asserts that a supplier-state must first consider, before making any transfer, "Whether governmental actions, statements, and policies of the recipient state are supportive of nuclear non-proliferation and whether the recipient state is in compliance with its international obligations in the field of non-proliferation." And while we have been forced into binding obligations and inspections in perpetuity, the Prime Minister has agreed to the US and its cartel dropping all pretence of assured fuel supplies. This way lies the path to making India dependent on the US. A path that others have taken only to regret it.
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