Pakistan threatens nuclear arms race over India deal

[Blackwater]

mgakistan's military leadership is determined to maintain the current ratio of Indian to Pakistani nuclear warheads and is already concerned India is pulling ahead following the 2009 launch of a domestically-produced nuclear submarine.
Islamabad believes Washington's decision to support Indian membership of the Nuclear Suppliers' Group following its agreement to help India develop its civil nuclear power industry will help New Delhi to further increase its nuclear weapon arsenal. Neither India nor Pakistan are signatories to the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Pakistan's permanent representative to the Conference on Disarmament told delegates this week Washington's decision would "destabilise the security environment in South Asia." "Membership of the NSG will enable our neighbour to further expand upon its nuclear co-operation agreements and enhance its nuclear weapons and delivery capability. As a consequence, Pakistan will be forced to take measures to ensure the credibility of its deterrence," Zamir Akram told the conference.
He said that Pakistan's National Command Authority, headed by prime minister Yousuf Raza Gilani and a retired army general, had voiced its concern on the implications of the new civil nuclear co-operation deal between Indian and the US for Pakistan's security.
Pakistan also opposed Washington's decision to support Indian membership of the Missile Technology Control Regime, the Australia Group and the Wassenaar Arrangement.

Hasan-Askari Rizvi, a defence analyst, said Pakistan feared India would gain a seat at the world's nuclear inner circle and block nuclear technology to Islamabad.
"Pakistan is worried India will be an integral part of the system regulating nuclear technology. If that happens, getting any equipment even such as civilian reactors for power generation will be completely impossible," he said.
Other analysts said Pakistan's economic crisis meant it could not afford to increase its nuclear weapons arsenal.
Vikram Sood, former head of India's Research and Analysis Wing intelligence service said he believed Pakistan was using India's civilian nuclear power deal as an excuse to resist international pressure on disarmament and to build its nuclear weapon stock.
"This is blackmail. India's membership [of the NSG] would work the other way, we will be bound by rules and treaties, to ensure the non-Proliferation Treaty is followed. This is a Pakistani cover-up," he said.
Dr Gareth Price, a senior research fellow at the Chatham House think tank, said: "Clearly the US wants India as a regular nuclear partner and every step towards this has upset Pakistan."
"All of Pakistan's concerns have been ignored and Pakistan has been proven to have very little leverage in this."


mg:



http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/wor...eatens-nuclear-arms-race-over-India-deal.html

 

[Yusuf]

already posted elsewhere and discussion is on.