US aims to make us strategically subservient: Shourie

ON GUARD: NSG waiver is a US trap, Arun Shourie says on the Devil's Advocate.

        

Ads by Google

ibnlive.com is on mobile now. Read news, watch videos
be a Citizen Journalist. Log on to m.ibnlive.com NOW!

Related Stories

• UPA govt would not fall if Left withdraws support: CPI

• Vajpayee meets PM on nuclear deal

• Scrap N-deal if India conducts atomic test, says US lawmaker

Photogallery

Find us on Facebook | Join IBNLive community

Stay ahead with G-Talk Buddy | Click now!

  

How credible are the Bhartiya Janta Party’s concerns about the 123 agreement and the NSG waiver? Those are the key issues Karan Thapar explored on the Devil's Advocate with one of the parties most outspoken critics Arun Shourie.

Karan Thapar: Let’s start with your central objection that the 123 agreement traps India into Hyde Act which will end up emasculating and crippling its nuclear deterrent. Now that India has got a waiver from the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) and can trade with countries like France and Russia, hasn’t the 123 become irrelevant and, therefore, haven’t your concerns and objections become academic?

Arun Shourie: Each time something happens, we say let’s wait for the next one. This is to be seen as a chakravyuh, as an architecture. There are certain things in the Hyde Act, the123 agreement, the IAEA protocol, and there are certain thing in the additional protocols, which are yet to come, which has already been specified in the Hyde Act. In the NSG waiver, there are three other things, so it is all to be taken as a part of architecture.

NSG waiver in the end says that if any member country of the NSG is satisfied that conditions have arisen that it must stop nuclear commerce with India, then all countries should act in accordance of Paragraph 16 of the NSG guidelines.

Karan Thapar: This was in your series of articles in The Indian Express and I’m afraid you’re wrong. You’re referring to Paragraph 3e of the NSG waiver. Paragraph 3e doesn’t say this at all. All Paragraph 3e says is that NSG countries are required to consult and contact on the implementation of the waiver. It does not go as far as you’re suggesting

Arun Shourie: There is no reason we should have any doubt on that. So I’ll read out to you what it says. I’m reading paragraph 5e: “In the event that one or more participant governments consider that circumstances have arisen which require consultation, participating governments will meet and then act in accordance with Paragraph 16 of the guidelines.”

Karan Thapar: And that does not specify that all countries would stop just because one has stopped. Your interpretation is not just wrong but it is, forgive me, exaggerated.

Arun Shourie: It’s not either. It is exactly the interpretation of the Americans themselves. It is the assurance they have given to their Congress.

Karan Thapar: I’m afraid you’re wrong. The American Ambassador speaking to the Network 18 programme Indian Tonight on Wednesday made it crystal clear that Paragraph 3e does not amount to your interpretation. It doesn’t even amount to a periodic review. It is simply a process of contact and consultation on the implementation of the waiver.

Arun Shourie: That is not what the US Government has told the US Congress. Mr Mulford’s statement should be seen in that context.

Karan Thapar: Forgive me, the US government has not as yet communicated with the US Congress about the NSG waiver at all.

Arun Shourie: No, please understand what they have said in their record of their answers to questions of 45…

Karan Thapar: But that’s not in connection with the NSG waiver. That at best has a connection with the 123. The NSG waiver only happened last Saturday. Paragraph 16 doesn’t lead to automatic termination. I’m afraid your interpretation is a part of the confusion that’s entered into the debate.