India puts off talks, unable to clinch nuclear deal with the United States.
The future of a landmark nuclear energy accord between India and the United States looked deeply uncertain Wednesday after India's government put off talks with powerful communist opponents of the pact.
The meeting is now scheduled to take place next week. But even if it goes ahead, it's unclear what difference it will make with the communist parties steadfast in their opposition, reinforcing doubts over whether the deal can be clinched before President Bush leaves office. "We have several times made our position clear -- we are opposed to it," said Nilotpal Basu, a top official of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)
The deal would "undermine the independent foreign policy of India," he said, citing U.S. pressure on New Delhi to aid Washington's efforts to halt Iran's nuclear program. "We do not think this deal gives us any advantages."
U.S. policymakers see India as a counterweight to an ever-more powerful China, and the deal reverses three decades of American policy by allowing the shipment of nuclear fuel and technology to India, which has never signed international nonproliferation accords and yet has tested atomic weapons. India, in exchange, would allow international inspections of its civilian nuclear reactors.
For Bush, the deal -- the result of two years of painstaking negotiations -- would be a major foreign policy success amid the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and other crises. For India, the benefits are arguably greater. Its booming but energy-starved economy would gain access to much-needed nuclear fuel and technologies that it has long been denied because of its refusal to sign nonproliferation accords.
And even though the deal only covers civilian nuclear power, it tacitly acknowledges India as a nuclear-weapons state, giving its weapons program a degree of international legitimacy -- and adding to India's growing clout. But a wave of opposition from India's communist parties, which provide the governing coalition with its parliamentary majority, appears to have scuttled the pact for now.
U.S. officials said earlier this year that with American elections coming up -- and no guarantee the next U.S. administration will keep the deal on the table -- India needed to complete its end of the pact by May to give the U.S. Congress enough time to pass it. Congress breaks for the summer in early July, and many lawmakers will be busy campaigning in the fall.
It's now mid-June, and New Delhi has made no progress in reaching a separate deal with the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency that's needed before Congress can approve the pact. Wednesday's meeting was intended to persuade the communists to allow the government to secure a deal with the IAEA. It was canceled because of scheduling conflicts, Basu said.
Following the postponement, an Indian Foreign Ministry official said the deal was in "meltdown," although he held out hope for a last minute communist reversal. The official insisted on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.
A day earlier in Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey stressed that the Bush administration would "make every effort to move it through Congress" before leaving office in January. But he, too, suggested that is unlikely to happen. "We would certainly hope that the next administration, whoever comes to office in January, would also see this agreement as something fundamentally in America's interest," he told reporters on Tuesday.
Both Barack Obama and John McCain have endorsed the deal. But it is not clear if either would make it a priority. The nuclear deal faces opposition in the U.S., too. Critics there, including some in Congress, say providing U.S. fuel to India would free up India's limited domestic supplies of nuclear material for use in atomic weapons, which they argue could spark a nuclear arms race in Asia.
The future of a landmark nuclear energy accord between India and the United States looked deeply uncertain Wednesday after India's government put off talks with powerful communist opponents of the pact.
The meeting is now scheduled to take place next week. But even if it goes ahead, it's unclear what difference it will make with the communist parties steadfast in their opposition, reinforcing doubts over whether the deal can be clinched before President Bush leaves office. "We have several times made our position clear -- we are opposed to it," said Nilotpal Basu, a top official of the Communist Party of India (Marxist)
The deal would "undermine the independent foreign policy of India," he said, citing U.S. pressure on New Delhi to aid Washington's efforts to halt Iran's nuclear program. "We do not think this deal gives us any advantages."
U.S. policymakers see India as a counterweight to an ever-more powerful China, and the deal reverses three decades of American policy by allowing the shipment of nuclear fuel and technology to India, which has never signed international nonproliferation accords and yet has tested atomic weapons. India, in exchange, would allow international inspections of its civilian nuclear reactors.
For Bush, the deal -- the result of two years of painstaking negotiations -- would be a major foreign policy success amid the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and other crises. For India, the benefits are arguably greater. Its booming but energy-starved economy would gain access to much-needed nuclear fuel and technologies that it has long been denied because of its refusal to sign nonproliferation accords.
And even though the deal only covers civilian nuclear power, it tacitly acknowledges India as a nuclear-weapons state, giving its weapons program a degree of international legitimacy -- and adding to India's growing clout. But a wave of opposition from India's communist parties, which provide the governing coalition with its parliamentary majority, appears to have scuttled the pact for now.
U.S. officials said earlier this year that with American elections coming up -- and no guarantee the next U.S. administration will keep the deal on the table -- India needed to complete its end of the pact by May to give the U.S. Congress enough time to pass it. Congress breaks for the summer in early July, and many lawmakers will be busy campaigning in the fall.
It's now mid-June, and New Delhi has made no progress in reaching a separate deal with the U.N.'s International Atomic Energy Agency that's needed before Congress can approve the pact. Wednesday's meeting was intended to persuade the communists to allow the government to secure a deal with the IAEA. It was canceled because of scheduling conflicts, Basu said.
Following the postponement, an Indian Foreign Ministry official said the deal was in "meltdown," although he held out hope for a last minute communist reversal. The official insisted on anonymity because of the sensitivity of the situation.
A day earlier in Washington, U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey stressed that the Bush administration would "make every effort to move it through Congress" before leaving office in January. But he, too, suggested that is unlikely to happen. "We would certainly hope that the next administration, whoever comes to office in January, would also see this agreement as something fundamentally in America's interest," he told reporters on Tuesday.
Both Barack Obama and John McCain have endorsed the deal. But it is not clear if either would make it a priority. The nuclear deal faces opposition in the U.S., too. Critics there, including some in Congress, say providing U.S. fuel to India would free up India's limited domestic supplies of nuclear material for use in atomic weapons, which they argue could spark a nuclear arms race in Asia.
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