Don't Sign Nuclear Deal

Date: 
Thursday, October 2, 2008

Press Statement

 The Polit Bureau of the Communist Party of India (Marxist) has issued the following statement:

 Don’t Sign Nuclear Deal : It Will Be A Surrender

 The US Congress has adopted an Act to approve the 123 Agreement. This Act is a Hyde Act plus version which has the key provisions of the Hyde Act and much more. The Act passed by the Congress spells out clearly that:

 · India does not have fuel supply assurance

· No assurance regarding building a strategic fuel reserve for the life time of the reactor

· Whatever corrective measures it takes regarding fuel supply failure does not permit taking the reactors out of safeguards

· The consent to reprocess is only notional

· The US will also work to prevent other countries from providing nuclear supplies to India, if the US terminates the 123 Agreement.

 Condoleezza Rice has further assured the Congress that India will be barred from Enrichment and Reprocessing Technology in the next NSG meeting to be held in November, formalizing an unofficial consensus reached during the NSG waiver meeting of September 4-6.

The letter written by the Indian Foreign Secretary to Under Secretary William Burns on September 10 also makes clear the other terms of the Agreement. India is committing to buy a minimum of 10,000 MW from the dying US nuclear industry, which has not received any new order for the last 30 years. It is going to indemnify suppliers from all consequences of a nuclear accident.

 The device of getting a Presidential signing statement to waive the objectionable provisions of the Act will not hold water, as this is a law passed by Congress and Bush will not be President after four months.

 The Manmohan Singh government has been claiming that the Hyde Act will be overridden by the last Act passed by the US Congress as per US jurisprudence. Now the last Act contains all the Hyde Act restrictions and they have been made more explicit.

 After this, if the Congress led government still goes ahead and signs the 123 Agreement, it will be a complete surrender to the United States and a betrayal of India’s vital interests.