Latest from Obama regime: India, 3 other countries must sign NPT

7 May 2009

NEW DELHI: The Obama administration's "different policy orientation" towards India may not have fully unfolded yet, but New Delhi is already facing the heat. After the US ambivalence over India's relations with Pakistan vis-a-vis the war in Afghanistan, comes the statement by assistant secretary of state Rose Gottemoeller that India, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea must sign the Non Proliferation Treaty, the global pact against atomic weapons.

The statement made during a UN meet attended by all 189 NPT signatories might appear generic, as India was named alongwith the three other recognised sovereign states who have not signed the treaty, but it has certainly riled New Delhi as its stand is unambiguous -- that it abides by non-proliferation in principle but it will not sign the treaty because it discriminates between nuclear weapon states and non-nuclear weapon states.

"We are with the rest of the world as far as non-proliferation is concerned. If we still appear to be dancing to another tune, it's because we don't want to sign a flawed and discriminatory treaty. India is a responsible power as manifested in our no first use commitment," said a senior official who did not want to be named.

Well known strategic affairs expert K Subrahmanyam, however, said India should follow a policy of wait and watch. "India's case is unique and it cannot be bracketed with the three others. The world has recognised that India has a strategic arsenal. The NSG waiver last year was facilitated also by countries like Russia and UK. As for any shift after the Obama administration taking over, I think we should still wait and watch," said Subrahmanyam.

Gottemoeller had said in her statement that adherence to NPT was a fundamental objective for the US. "Universal adherence to the NPT itself, including by India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea...remains a fundamental objective of the United States," Gottemoeller said in her statement even as she defended the Indo-US civil nuclear deal citing India's support to the US in conceiving an international treaty that would prohibit the further production of bomb grade nuclear material.

The Obama administration has maintained all along that it wants to strengthen the NPT framework but in the case of India, it might eventually boil down to how the new administrator looks upon India's nuclear weapons. As former US ambassador to India Robert Blackwill said on Tuesday, "It's not clear to me how they regard India's nuclear weapons -- as a destabilising factor in South Asia; as a fact of life to grudgingly tolerate or as a natural development from a close democratic collaborator and rising great power."

He added, "The US should treat India as a nuclear weapon state. Any American backsliding in that regard would produce a very strong negative reaction from New Delhi."

"I would say that with regard to India's agreement with the US on peaceful nuclear uses that the US has been able to agree with India to undertake a number of activities that would bring it in closure cooperation with other countries in the general non-proliferation regime," Gottemoeller said on Tuesday.