US to Object to Sino-Pak Civilian Nuke Deal
As Sino-Pak civilian nuclear deal comes before the Nuclear Suppliers Group next week, the Obama Administration has decided to express its objection to the deal which seeks establishment of two nuclear reactors in Pakistan, said media reports.
According to experts, the agreement seems to be in violation of international guidelines which forbids nuclear exports to countries which are not signatories to the NPT or do not have international safeguards on reactors, reports said.
The Washington Post reported that the Sino-Pak nuclear deal was expected to come up before the 46-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) meeting next week in New Zealand.
State department spokesman Gordon DuGuid said that the US government ‘has reiterated to the Chinese government that the United States expects Beijing to cooperate with Pakistan in ways consistent with Chinese nonproliferation obligations’, said reports.
An eminent American nuclear expert said in a recent article that the deal would infringe international protocol about the trade of nuclear equipment and material, reports said.
“The move would breach international protocol about the trade of nuclear equipment and material,” Mark Hibbs was quoted as saying in the latest issue of the prestigious Foreign Policy magazine.
The China National Nuclear Corporation is financing for two new reactors at Chashma in Pakistan’s Punjab province.
The Post said that China has suggested the sale is grandfathered from the time before it joined the NSG in 2004, because it was completing work on two earlier reactors for Pakistan at the time.
According to US officials, however, any such proposal needs a consensus approval by the NSGm, said reports.
“Additional nuclear cooperation with Pakistan beyond those specific projects that were grandfathered in 2004 would require consensus approval’ by the NSG, a US official was quoted as saying, and added that this the US believes ‘is extremely unlikely’.
(Based on internet reports)
