Nuclear Suppliers Group revises guidelines, India wary

The Nuclear Suppliers Group's (NSG) stated intent of "continuing to consider all aspects of the implementation of the 2008 Statement on Civil Nuclear Cooperation with India," has evoked concerned reactions from strategic experts in Delhi

At the same time the NSG's ambiguousness in "strengthening" its guidelines on transfer of sensitive enrichment and reprocessing technologies (ENR) has further made India wary.

Though officially there is still no clarity as to what these "strengthening" measures are, they are being widely seen as an attempt to ban ENR transfers to non-NPT nations, thus effectively nullifying India's chances of getting ENR access from NSG countries.

Commodore (retd.) C Uday Bhaskar, an expert on strategic and security issues, said, conceptually the emerging developments could be a "setback" for India. "NSG has not been forthcoming in endorsing the September 2008 exceptional status it granted to India. It seems to have returned to its earlier stand of signing CTBT, NPT."

"It is also disappointing, considering NSG operates by consensus, not even one country supported India's stand on the basis of the waiver granted to it in 2008. Had even one country done it, we could have prevented this from happening," Bhaskar said.

The Indian government has reportedly expressed its concern to the US and NSG over what it sees as a rollback of the NSG "clean waiver" given to India in September 2008 (despite India's non-NPT status and clear stand in opening only its civil nuclear facilities to IAEA scrutiny), and the US promised support (under the Indo-US nuclear agreement) for India's entry into the four international nuclear non-proliferation regimes, including the NSG, Wassenaar Arrangement, Australia Group and the Zangger Committee.

Former diplomat and India's ambassador to the United Nations Conference on Disarmament, Arundhati Ghose said, "The NSG has not yet given the "criterion" and in what form it has decided to "strengthen" guidelines. Besides, to make these guidelines legally binding, they would have to be first adopted by the NSG member nations by making amendments to their individual national laws."

She pointed out the case of Australia which in 2008 supported the NSG waiver to India but refused to change its national laws for enabling nuclear commerce with India. Since 2008 India has, however, progressively moved forward on this front with Russia and France. In 2009, France categorically stated that Indo-French ENR trade would be unaffected by any "NSG ban on ENR transfer". Talks are already on with Russia for a bilateral agreement on ENR transfers. Experts however feel, things could become more complicated now.

In a recent public statement the US government has sought to reaffirm its stand on the issue: "The Obama administration fully supports the "clean" NSG exception for India and speedy implementation of the US-India Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement."

It further said: "The NSG's NPT references, including those in the ENR guidelines, in no way detract from the exception granted to India by NSG members in 2008 and in no way reflect upon India's Non-proliferation record. These references reinforce the commitment of NSG members to prevent the transfer of items that could be used for weapon purposes, which is the mission of the regime itself and a basic non-proliferation principle shared by India."

But certain segments of the statement show a clear distinction the US is trying to make, which is being read with concern here: "Efforts in the NSG to strengthen controls on the transfers of ENR are consistent with long-standing US policy that pre-dates the Civil Nuclear Agreement and have been reaffirmed on an annual basis by the G8 for years. This new guideline reflects a consensus among all NSG members."

"There is a contradiction in America's stand on transfer of ENR and India's membership of the NPT. India has expressed its concern to US over this," said Ghose.

Another former Indian diplomat DNA spoke to said the US statement was "wishy-washy and bland" and "affirmed nothing". "US gave so many concessions to India, not for nothing. They wanted business from India. Russia and France picked up a lot. Now the US is saying we will travel on the same train. But to do that India will have to change their nuclear liability law which they will not be able to do because of domestic pressures. Russian companies have sovereign guarantee." He further said the US may be trying to cap our nuclear weapons programme and opening them to international scrutiny.

Bhaskar said India would have to now bilaterally engage with individual NSG nations. "Between 2008 and 2011, metaphorically speaking, India's strategic stock has fallen. India lost an opportunity in 2008, 2009. They should have settled this issue then itself. It is now imperative for India to negotiate bilaterally with individual countries. NSG guidelines are not legally binding. It depends on interpretation...how each country decides its obligation to the NSG and its commitment to India," he said hoping India would engage with the platform European Union has provided.

However, Ghose indicated such an individual engagement may not be very easy. "NSG members have a very heavy moral burden," she said, citing the case of Russia, which in 2006 had to make an explanation to the NSG over its supply of Uranium for India's Tarapore plant that was running out of fuel. Moscow had then excused itself over the issue citing NSG's "safety exception clause," and later reportedly conveyed its discomfort to India in repeating such help in future.