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5+1? Or, just above Paki? Scoop on nuke agreement with IAEA
5-plus-1 tag in nuke draft
Delhi dashes to Vienna with pact
K.P. NAYAR (Kolkata, Telegraph, July 10, 2008)
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh with US President George W Bush in Hokkaido on Wednesday. (PTI)
Washington, July 9: A 20-page text of the nuclear safeguards agreement circulated in Vienna today places India in the global non-proliferation regime a notch above Pakistan and North Korea.
But it leaves New Delhi in a category below the five nuclear weapons states — Russia, China, France, Britain and the US — that are recognised under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), according to diplomats who formally received the agreement from the secretariat of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) this afternoon.
The text is titled 'Agreement with the Government of India for the Application of Safeguards to Civilian Nuclear Facilities'.
India, Pakistan and North Korea are the only three countries outside the NPT regime that have tested nuclear weapons. Israel is well-known to have the bomb, but it refuses to acknowledge that it has even mastered the scientific cycles that precede the production of atom bombs.
Diplomats in Vienna are already referring to India and the five recognised nuclear weapons states collectively following the circulation of the agreement as "five plus one".
This means India will be in a special category within the global non-proliferation regime if the IAEA's board of governors approve the safeguards agreement at its yet to be scheduled meeting.
IAEA spokesperson Melissa Fleming emphasised that "the text of the draft agreement is not public" and that the agency's officials have been told not to give any interviews to the media on the subject "at this time".
But the Vienna International Centre on the banks of the Danube, the IAEA property leased from the Austrian government for 99 years, leaks like a sieve: it is, therefore possible to construct an idea of what India can expect from the safeguards pact from diplomats who are willing to talk about it on background.
Diplomats who have perused today's text said it has many structural similarities with the Hyde Act approved by the US Congress to facilitate the Indo-US nuclear deal.
Like the Hyde Act, the IAEA's agreement with India is long on preamble which sums up the reasons for bringing India into a special category in the current global nuclear non-proliferation regime.
Like the Hyde Act, whose preamble and non-operative parts were necessary to satisfy the diverse lobbies and constituencies in the US Congress, the one in the Vienna document was also necessary to bring round those members of the IAEA board who have reservations about a safeguards agreement that overlooks New Delhi's refusal to sign the NPT.
It was not immediately clear if today's document satisfactorily answers the five questions raised by Left parties in their joint statement about the UPA government's negotiations with the IAEA.
But diplomats said the safeguards agreement will "definitely not" permit spare parts or fuel — even in the event of any shortage — to be transferred between nuclear facilities under IAEA safeguards and those outside it as part of India's weapons programme.
Fleming said the chairman of the board, Milenko Skoknic of Chile, had already begun consultations with fellow governors to fix a date for convening a board meeting to approve the agreement.
Issue Date: Thursday , July 10 , 2008
http://telegraphindia.com/1080710/jsp/f ... 529905.jsp#
IAEA Press Releases
Press Release 2008/08
Draft India Safeguards Agreement Circulated to IAEA Board Members
9 July 2008 | At the request of the Government of India, the IAEA Secretariat today circulated to Members of the IAEA Board of Governors for their consideration the draft of an Agreement with the Government of India for the Application of Safeguards to Civilian Nuclear Facilities.
The Chairman of the Board is consulting with Board Members to agree on a date for a Board meeting when the Agreement would be considered.
Note to editors: The text of the draft Agreement is not public. IAEA Officials will not be giving interviews at this time.
Press Contact
Melissa Fleming
Spokesperson and Head, Media and Outreach Section
Division of Public Information
[43-1] 2600-21273
press at iaea.org
About the IAEA
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) serves as the world's foremost intergovernmental forum for scientific and technical co-operation in the peaceful use of nuclear technology. Established as an autonomous organization under the United Nations (UN) in 1957, the IAEA carries out programmes to maximize the useful contribution of nuclear technology to society while verifying its peaceful use.
NOTE TO EDITORS: For additional information visit the Press Section of the IAEA's website (
http://www.iaea.org/Resources/Journalists/), or call the IAEA's Division of Public Information at (431) 2600-21270.
http://www.iaea.org/NewsCenter/PressRel ... 00808.html
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