India has alerted the United States and all other countries that intend to have nuclear pacts with Pakistan to first look at its track record before signing any deal.
Reacting sharply to the news reports that said USA was working out a civil nuclear agreement with Pakistan which would be similar to that with India signed in 2005, External Affairs spokesperson Vikas Swarup said, “We have seen these reports and it is not for the first time this issue has surfaced. Whosoever is examining that particular dossier should be well aware of Pakistan’s track record in the area of proliferation. And when India got this particular deal it was on the basis of our own impeccable non-proliferation track record. That is the reason US gave us 123 agreement in 2005 and that is why we got a NSG waiver in 2008. Pakistan’s track record is completely different so we hope that will taken into account in making any such decision.”
The article in the Washington Post said the White House is exploring the possibility of a deal which aims at limiting and controlling Pakistan’s nuclear weapons and delivery systems. It said the nuclear dialogue would begin to address what US officials for two decades have viewed as one of the world’s most dangerous security problems. It added US would like Pakistan to restrict its nuclear programme to weapons and delivery systems that are appropriate to its actual Defence needs against India’s nuclear threat.
The article came just a month after US had asked Pakistan and all other nuclear-armed countries to exercise “restraint” in expanding their nuclear capabilities after two American think-tanks said Pakistan could have the third largest stockpile of atomic weapons in about a decade.
Interestingly, the US administration under George W Bush in 2005 had refused to entertain any proposal for a nuclear deal with Pakistan, saying the pact with India was an exception which could not be replicated with Islamabad.
India has at several forums expressed concerns over Pakistan-sponsored terrorism. And enriching the country where the world’s biggest Al-Qaeeda terrorist Osama-bin-laden was living in military garrison. Pakistan leaders have often been heard using the nuclear threat against any war with India, besides Pakistan scientist Abdul Qadeer Khan leaking the nuclear technology to countries like North Korea is no hidden fact.
Meanwhile, the External Affairs official said that during the United Nations General Assembly, Pakistan had insisted for holding talks between National Security Advisors simultaneously with the meeting between Foreign Ministers that could cover all aspects of Indo-Pak disputes. “There was an issue of sequencing on meetings. But we are committing to Ufa understanding and the format agreed there. India has made it very clear that the main issue of discontent between the two countries is terrorism and that has to be discussed first to let any other talks begin,” Swarup added.