New Delhi
11 January 2008
The UPA Government can be expected to firm up the contours of an
India-specific safeguards agreement next week, according to Foreign Secretary
Shivshankar Menon.
An Indian delegation comprising officials from the Department of Atomic Energy (DAE)
will resume talks with the IAEA Secretariat in Vienna on January 16 and/or 17. Three
rounds of talks have been held so far.
In the last round of talks held in Vienna from January 2 to 5, the team headed by DAE
Director (Strategic Planning) Ravi B Grover failed to secure a satisfactory response from
the IAEA on India's rights to create a strategic reserve of nuclear fuel or to take corrective
measures in the event of an interruption in the supply of the fuel.
"We hope to wrap it up. The discussions are proceeding smoothly," Foreign Secretary
Shivshankar Menon on Friday told a reporter who wanted to know about the status of the
negotiations with the IAEA.
New Delhi hoped to reach a "rapid and satisfactory conclusion" of the negotiations in the
meeting next week, Mr Menon added at a news conference called to brief the media on
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to China.
Atomic Energy Commission Chairman Anil Kakodkar and IAEA Director General Mohamed
ElBaradei met in Vienna on November 21, 2007. They agreed to initiate consultations on
an India-specific safeguards agreement.
In response to another question, Mr Menon said that Prime Minister Singh can be
expected to raise the issue of India's quest for harnessing civil nuclear energy in his
meetings with the Chinese leadership in Beijing.
He explained that India and China have worked together in the past in the field of civil
nuclear energy. China supplied low enriched uranium fuel for the nuclear power plants at
Tarapur in Maharashtra.
"We will raise the subject again," Mr Menon said. New Delhi hoped to work together with
Beijing "when the way is clear", he added, alluding to outcome of the talks with the IAEA
and the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG).
He, nevertheless, insisted that the time has not come for New Delhi to seek Beijing's
support in the 45-member NSG. "We haven't come to that point," he said. India is
seeking a clean and unconditional exemption from the NSG.
The UPA Government is trying to secure an India-specific safeguards pact quickly so that
the NSG can relax its guidelines and the US Congress can endorse the India-US civil
nuclear cooperation agreement at the earliest.
However, the agreed text of the India-specific safeguards agreement will need to placed
before the UPA-Left committee for its consideration. The Left parties are opposed to the
nuclear deal and they have asked the government not to operationalise it.
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