Rice calls Indian PM to move ahead with the N-deal
IRNA - Islamic Republic News Agency
New Delhi, May 6, IRNA
India-US-Nuke
US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice telephoned India's Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh urging him to personally intervene and ensure that the 123 agreement was signed at the earliest so that it could be voted on by the US Congress.
According to an Indian English daily, 'Asian Age', this was a little over a week ago, just before Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon was dispatched to Washington to give fresh impetus to the negotiations on the deal, .
The US-based India Abroad, quoting senior US officials, carried a report on the telephone call in detail, maintaining that Ms Rice called the prime minister to 'all but caution' him to move ahead with the deal as the momentum gathered to push through the enabling legislation (Hyde Act) would dissipate rapidly and adversely affect the vote on the deal at the end of the bilateral negotiations.
Rice reportedly stressed on the 'now or never' aspect of the deal.
Menon's visit, sources here said, was clearly to open a way for political intervention that will be more visible when Prime Minister Singh and US President George W. Bush meet on the sidelines of the G-8 meeting in June.
Rice and US nuclear point person Nicholas Burns have made it clear to Dr Manmohan Singh and Menon respectively that the US is in no mood to move even an inch forward on the negotiations as the 'ball is now in India's court'.
They have stressed on the need for political intervention to move the negotiations out of the woods with Burns going on record to describe the outcome of the talks as 'frustrating'.
Rice had told the Indian prime minister that she could India's reticence now to conclude the 123 agreement despite the fact that the US had met its side of the commitments.
US officials have been openly saying, that Washington did not push for an early clearance for India at the Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting at Cape Town recently as New Delhi had not kept its part of the deal.
Sources here said that the kid gloves were now off and the Bush administration had decided to push the Manmohan Singh government for an early completion of the deal.
Nuclear experts are categorical that President Bush and his negotiators cannot move out of the parameters set by the Hyde Act and ignore the points central to India' s right to test and reprocess spent fuel.
The letter written to the prime minister by the seven US Congressmen, the second after a group of senators had fired off a similar missive a fortnight ago, came into public view through the Washington Post.
The political parties, the BJP and the Left, have demanded a detailed statement from the prime minister about the status of the 123 negotiations and the progress made on the Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) gas pipeline.
The political parties will take up the issue in Parliament again on Monday with the MPs pointing out that the US Congressmen had used highly objectionable language.
The CPI has started exerting pressure from within the Left Front for a review of its support to the UPA government.
The CPI(M) politburo, in a statement here, has noted that the 'Hyde Act passed by the US Congress had set out unacceptable terms' on how India should conduct itself with regard to Iran and other foreign policy issues.
The BJP has lodged a strong protest against the letter and has warned against any compromise on the nuclear issue.
The US state department spokesperson, Sean McCormack, however, indicated that any forward movement after Menon's crucial visit will 'require some creativity and some compromise on both sides in order to get an agreement done if we are going to be able to move this as quickly as we would have hoped'.
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