New Delhi
7 November 2007
India will send an expert to Switzerland to explain the details of the
proposed India-United States civil nuclear cooperation agreement, visiting Swiss
President Micheline Calmy-Rey said.
"I requested the Prime Minister to have an Indian expert to explain the India-US nuclear
deal. The Prime Minister said that he will send somebody," Ms Calmy-Rey told a news
conference before concluding her four-day visit to India.
She said that the India-US nuclear deal was discussed in her talks with Prime Minister
Manmohan Singh but said in response to a question that her country would need to know
more details before it could take a firmer position on the issue.
Switzerland, like India, a member of the Board of Governors of the International Atomic
Energy Agency for 2007-2008. Switzerland is also a member of the Nuclear Suppliers
Group (NSG). India wants the NSG to lift the restrictions on doing nuclear commerce with,
and by, India.
The Swiss President said that she was "ery satisfied"with the outcome of her visit to
India and that she looked forward to a "privileged partnership" with India to
institutionalise the bilateral discussions at the political and expert levels and to deepen
the cooperation in the areas of economy, culture, education, science and technology, and
tourism.
She explained that both sides would need to engage in an "exercise of defining our
priorities" before they could enter into a memorandum of understanding or sign an
agreement on the privileged partnership.
On Pakistan, the Swiss president said that her government has suspended "field visits"
in that country and the Swiss Federal Council will meet next week to discuss the issue of
export of weapons to Pakistan and decide further course of action. "We are evaluating
the situation regularly ... daily," she said.
She hoped that the negotiations on a bilateral free trade area agreement would begin by
the year-end. Swiss Air plans to reopen the route between Zurich and New Delhi on
November 25 this year to cope with the surge in Indian tourists travelling to Switzerland.
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