Buzz builds: Pak to get 2 n-reactors from China

[Zaki]

Buzz builds: Pak to get 2 n-reactors from China

Wed, Apr 28 04:16 AM

Persistent speculation in recent weeks that China plans to supply two nuclear reactors to Pakistan in defiance of international rules gained fresh momentum today as a leading Washington think tank reported that Beijing is about to announce the deal.

Such a decision could cloud the recent improvement in Sino-Indian relations amidst the assessment that Beijing may justify the deal with Pakistan on the grounds of nuclear stability in South Asia and the need for parity between Delhi and Islamabad.

Well known nuclear analyst Mark Hibbs, currently at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington, said in a report today that "contrary to guidelines adopted in 1992 by nuclear equipment supplier states in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), China is poised to export two power reactors to Pakistan".

"China has argued", according to Hibbs, "that there are compelling political reasons concerning the stability of South Asia to justify the exports."

Citing diplomatic sources, Hibbs says that China will "not justify the transactions on the basis of any confidential commercial agreements between China and Pakistan".

Under the current guidelines of the nuclear suppliers group (NSG), no nuclear transfers are allowed to countries that do not sign the non-proliferation treaty or do not accept comprehensive international safeguards on their nuclear programme. While India got an exemption to this framework in 2008, the rules continue to apply to Pakistan.

China has had expansive military and civil nuclear cooperation with Pakistan since the late 1970s, but Beijing had agreed to severely limit it when it joined the NSG in 2004. Yet as negotiations on the Indo-US civil nuclear initiative limped along after it was announced in July 2005, Beijing allowed its state entities to negotiate an agreement to sell two nuclear reactors to Pakistan in 2006.

China's political leadership, however, was unwilling to confirm this deal when President Hu Jintao visited Pakistan at the end of 2006. In the last few weeks there have been frequent reports in Pakistani media that Beijing is now ready to press ahead.

The Carnegie report today cited senior NSG diplomats as saying that they expect Beijing to "inform the NSG of its planned transaction". The report also added that the Obama administration might "accept a limited amount of additional Chinese nuclear commerce with Pakistan as a price for getting Chinese support on UN Security Council sanctions against Iran in weeks ahead."

 

[Soham]

Such a decision could cloud the recent improvement in Sino-Indian relations amidst the assessment that Beijing may justify the deal with Pakistan on the grounds of nuclear stability in South Asia and the need for parity between Delhi and Islamabad.

I doubt that. We are fully aware of various grounds of co-operation between China and Pakistan. And we also know that all these mutual military/nuclear projects will not be stopped for the sake of improving Sino-Indian relations.
Both India and China have very modest expectations from each other, on the diplomatic table.

The world knows and we know, that any possibility of parity between New Delhi and Islamabad is a non-existent pipe-dream. Our two nations are on entirely different levels, economically and militarily.

 

[Yusuf]

US unlikely to openly criticise Sino-Pak nuke trade: Report

WASHINGTON: China is all set to export two nuclear power plants to Pakistan in violation of the guidelines of the Nuclear Suppliers Group that require NPT signatory states to supply such equipment only with comprehensive IAEA safeguards, a US think tank said today.

But the Obama Administration is unlikely to openly criticise such a deal, given its overwhelming dependence on Islamabad for its Afghan operations even though it might object to it inside the NSG, the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace said in its report released today.

"Contrary to guidelines adopted in 1992 by nuclear equipment supplier states in the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), China is poised to export two power reactors to Pakistan.

"This transaction is about to happen at a time when China's increasingly ambitious nuclear energy programme is becoming more autonomous," said the report authored by Mark Hibbs, a senior associate in the Nuclear Policy Programme.

Guidelines of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), representing 46 NPT states, call on parties to the NPT not to supply nuclear equipment to non-nuclear-weapon states, including Pakistan, without comprehensive IAEA safeguards.

The United States and other NSG states may object to the pending transaction but they cannot prevent China, which joined the NSG in 2004, from exporting the reactors.

"Senior officials in NSG states friendly to the United States said this month they expect that President Barack Obama will not openly criticise the Chinese export because Washington, in the context of a bilateral security dialogue with Islamabad, may be sensitive to Pakistan's desire for civilian nuclear cooperation in the wake of the sweeping US- India nuclear deal which entered into force in 2008 after considerable arm-twisting of NSG states by the United States, France, and Russia," it said.

"The United States may also tolerate China's new nuclear deal with Pakistan because Obama wants China's support for United Nations Security Council sanctions against Iran this spring," Hibbs observed.

Hibbs said the pending Sino-Pakistan reactor deal reflects the growing confidence and assertiveness of China's nuclear energy programme as it establishes a track record of reliability in reactor construction and operation.

"Chinese nuclear entities are wary of interference from the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in their programmes and are keen to establish their freedom of action vis-a-vis cooperating foreign governments and firms," it said.

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/...Pak-nuke-trade-Report/articleshow/5866717.cms

 

[Yusuf]

Might as well abandon the NPT if there is going to be blinking on proliferation. Everyone knows how Sino Pak cooperation has been in the past and for what purpose. Why not just expand the God damn NPT and include India and Pak in it and get over with it. At least what is happening underground will happen in the open and get some transparency. That India and Pak are not going to give up their weapons is cast in stone,steel. So whats the use of keeping them out and cut separate deals?

 

[A.V.]

Might as well abandon the NPT if there is going to be blinking on proliferation

the NPT, the CTBT the MTCR all these need big changes when they were formulated times were different and the treaties do favour the then existing powers with the rise of different aspects of global functioning and all of then needs to have a deep review and update also having MR HOPE ruling the worlds only super power dosent help this guy is a spineless big mouth all talk not action nuclear summit and what not openly the chinese the russians and even the smaller nations are showing the middle fingure and doing what they please while MR HOPE keeps on talking and talking without anything worthwhile