As Govt teeters, India to tell IAEA why it's a big deal

[struggle4progress]

Source: CNN-IBN

Published on Fri, Jul 18, 2008 at 09:09
Updated at Fri, Jul 18, 2008 in World section

New Delhi: India will brief representatives of a total of 54 countries from the IAEA Board of Governors and the NSG on the safeguards agreement of the Indo-US nuclear deal on Friday ...

Menon will be helped in the task by a top official of the Department of Atomic Energy, R B Grover, India's permanent envoy to the IAEA, Saurabh Kumar and the MEA's negotiator on the agreement, Venkatesh Varma ...

Read more: http://www.ibnlive.com/news/as-govt-teeters-india-to-tell-iaea-why-its-a-big-deal/69082-2.html

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Tarigami leads protests against nuke deal
GK NEWS NETWORK

Srinagar, July 17: Terming nuclear deal a “dangerous gameplan”, Communist Party of India (M) Thursday observed that United States of America (USA) has hidden agenda behind the nuclear deal and it would not meet the demands of energy security of India.

Addressing protestors at Partap Park here, CPI (M) state secretary Mohammad Yousuf Tarigami said, “In reality the deal is to promote the strategic ties with USA but not to meet the demands of the energy security,” adding that the sovergnity of India is sure to be eroded if the deal goes through.

Giving details about the 123 Agreement and Hyde Act which form the axis of the deal, Tarigami said that the name 123 actually comes from the section 123 of the US Atomic Energy Act, under which the US can go for bilateral civilian nuclear cooperation agreement with any other country, adding that according to its Atomic Energy Act, US can not have nuclear cooperation with a country that is not signatory to Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the Hyde Act gives the US Administration the waiver to reach a pact with India, which has not signed NPT.

He informed that through nuclear deal, India will purchase nuclear fuel and reactors from US at exorbitant prices to augment its energy needs, adding that the campaign that the nuclear energy only can meet the demands of India’s energy requirements in the future has categorically been rejected by the left parties ...

http://www.greaterkashmir.com/full_story.asp?Date=18_7_2008&ItemID=62&cat=21

Suspend all action on N-deal: BJP
NDTV Correspondent
Friday, July 18, 2008 (New Delhi)

The BJP has questioned the government's decision to send a team of officials to Vienna to brief IAEA board members barely four days before the trust vote in Parliament.

The party is worried about reports suggesting that the nuclear deal was a done deal irrespective of the UPA government's survival.

It is now demanding that the government suspend all further action on the Indo-US nuclear deal until it proves its majority in Lok Sabha ...

http://www.ndtv.com/convergence/ndtv/story.aspx?id=NEWEN20080057612&ch=7/18/2008%208:41:00%20AM

Kerala Assembly Adopts Resolution Against Nuke Deal
Date Submitted: Thu Jul 17, 2008

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM - Kerala Assembly on July 11 adopted a resolution asking the Center to drop the Indo-U.S. nuclear deal, amidst uproar.

The 240-member House adopted the private resolution moved by V.N. Vasavan of Communist Party of India – Marxist (CPI-M) asking the UPA Government not to go ahead with the deal, with only the ruling Left Democratic Front members taking part in the voting.

In all, 79 members voted in favor of the resolution while the Congress-led United Democratic Front members abstained from voting ...

http://www.indiajournal.com/pages/event.php?id=3898

U.S. sends top envoy to IAEA

WASHINGTON: The Bush administration has despatched a top envoy to Vienna to bolster support for the India-U.S. nuclear deal on Friday when India is to brief the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors on the safeguards pact.

U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs William Burns will be at the IAEA headquarters en route to Geneva for a weekend meeting over Iran’s controversial nuclear programme.

“Friday, he’s going to have some consultations at the International Atomic Energy Agency, related to the nuclear deal,” State Department spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters here. “... I don’t have many more details for you than that, that he is going to be in Vienna at the IAEA for some consultations on the civil nuclear deal...,” he said of the trip by Mr. Burns. Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon will present India’s case at the IAEA ...

http://www.hindu.com/2008/07/18/stories/2008071861411600.htm

25,000 N-weapons still in existence
18 Jul 2008, 0053 hrs IST, Srinivas Laxman,TNN

Sixty-three years after the US triggered the atomic age by testing the world's first nuclear bomb, an International Atomic Energy Agency report revealed that progress in disarmament has been slow with some 25,000 nukes still in existence, thousands of them in a quick-launch alert.

The report, 'Reinforcing the Global Nuclear Order for Peace and Prosperity: The Role of the IAEA to 2020 and Beyond', has been prepared by an independent commission at the IAEA's request. Among the commission members was former atomic energy commission chairman Rajagopala Chidambaram, architect of India's nuclear weapons tests in 1998. The report regrets that the pace of disarmament has been sluggish four decades after the NPT (Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty) was signed.

The report says that nuclear states point to ongoing reduction in their nuclear stockpiles as evidence that they are fulfilling their NPT obligations. "By contrast, many non-nuclear weapons states see the progress as too slow and believe that the nuclear weapons states are not serious about carrying out their obligations," it says. The reductions that have occurred either have not been verified or have been verified only between the US and Russia, offering limited transparency to the broader international community.

The report says countries with nuclear weapons are pursuing the production of weapons-grade material and increasing their reliance on nukes, designing new weapons and laying plans for maintaining nuclear arsenals indefinitely. At the 2000 NPT review conference, nuclear states had committed to accomplish the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals. "But few of these steps have yet been implemented," the report says ...

http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/World/25000_N-weapons_still_in_existence/articleshow/3247132.cms