US, India discuss nuclear pact
Posted 3 hours 59 minutes ago
US President George W Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh have discussed the controversial US-India civilian nuclear energy agreement, the White House said.
Their telephone conversation came as US officials look for ways to overcome stiff opposition in India and in the US Congress to the pact, which the embattled Mr Bush sees as a key foreign policy victory.
It also coincided with Australia's decision to end its ban on uranium sales to India, with senior ministers meeting to reverse a policy of selling the nuclear fuel only to signatories of the Non-Proliferation Treaty
"What I would point out to you is that the President and Prime Minister Singh have been very supportive of it, as it is debated there in India" after being concluded last month, Mr Bush's spokeswoman Dana Perino said.
"We'll see if we can get you some more in terms of how we can support Prime Minister Singh," she said.
"The civil nuclear agreement has many wonderful aspects to it, one of them being bringing India into the system of some monitoring and compliance."
The accord, which covers civil nuclear technology and seeks to bring India into the loop of global atomic commerce after a gap of three decades, was rejected almost immediately by the opposition and Mr Singh's communist allies.
"You have a country that has explosive population that very much needs access to clean-burning electricity, of which nuclear power certainly would be," Ms Perino told reporters while Bush was on his Texas ranch.
"That would help raise economic levels across the country, help create jobs as well as make sure that people aren't suffering from the ill effects that you can get from traditional energy uses like coal that can harm people's health.
"Nuclear power obviously doesn't have greenhouse gases, which can contribute to helping us reach the goals that the President has set for reducing greenhouse gas emissions."
The spokeswoman has noted that Mr Bush invited major global polluters - including China and India - to Washington for a September 27-28 conference on curbing greenhouse gas emissions.
The deal clinched in Washington last month allows India to buy civilian nuclear technology while possessing nuclear weapons, making it an exception under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
One of the trickiest issues - whether India's unilateral decision to test nuclear weapons would end the deal - appears to have been sidestepped.
The deal must also be approved by the US Congress and other nations under the umbrella of the Nuclear Suppliers Group.
