Hours before prime minister Manmohan Singh arrived in Washington, Indian officials involved in talks regarding the implementation of the civilian nuclear deal with the United States said the negotiations over key issues, including India’s right to reprocess spent fuel, were in the last leg.
“We hope that before the joint statement (between Singh and Barack Obama) is completed, it will be done,” said an official. “We are finalising the last stage of the nuclear deal. What we are looking for are up-front reprocessing rights.”
While the reprocessing pact will ease India’s anxieties about Obama’s commitment to the deal, New Delhi is likely to provide an “assurance” sought by the US government that American nuclear technology will not be passed on to a third country.
India and the United States have achieved a breakthrough in talks to finalise various details ahead of the implementation of the civilian nuclear deal. One of these is a pact allowing India to reprocess spent fuel in atomic power plants, official sources said. Prime minister Manmohan Singh’s state visit to the United States begins this week.
Indian negotiators led by RB Grover, technical head in the department of atomic energy, huddled over the weekend in marathon talks with the American side headed by Richard Stratford, director of the office of nuclear energy. Negotiations on the reprocessing pact, which started in July, are in the home stretch and will allow full implementation of the nuclear deal.
Manmohan Singh, whose July 2005 summit with former president George Bush forged the deal, is keen to see the signature foreign-policy achievement of their governments fulfiled. “We hope the reprocessing part is done before the joint statement is completed,” said Indian officials. “There are only one-and-a-half steps left. We are finalising the last stage of the nuclear deal and what we are looking for are upfront reprocessing rights.”
The reprocessing pact will ease India’s anxieties about president Obama’s commitment to the deal. India’s alarm about the fate of the deal spiked in September after Obama called for universal adherence to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). He later assured the prime minister that the US was committed to the nuclear deal.
The reprocessing pact will finalise the procedures that India should follow to reprocess spent fuel. In ongoing talks, both sides found more common ground on sticky issues, including US insistence on scrutinising the security of reprocessing facilities.
With this pact nearly done, the other big step left will be the approval of a civil liability legislation by India. Under this, India will seek to limit compensation by US companies in case of nuclear accidents. Negotiators told the US side that the civil liability bill is likely to come up for passage in the winter session of parliament.
New Delhi is also likely to provide an “assurance” sought by the US government that American nuclear technology given to India will not be passed on to a third country.
US analysts say Obama is likely to press India to agree to a test ban once he reverses America’s stance on the CTBT and accelerates a new treaty on capping fissile material production.
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