[Page S3634] Mr. GLENN S. Con. Res. 113 Mr. GLENN Mr. GLENN THE SPOILS OF PROLIFERATION [Page S3635] LESSONS FROM THE FRENCH CONNECTION [Page S3636] WITHER THE NPT? STANDARDS FOR NUCLEAR COOPERATION RESOLUTION ON FULL-SCOPE SAFEGUARDS [Page S3637] THE VALUE OF FULL-SCOPE SAFEGUARDS ADDITIONAL MEASURES NEEDED [Page S3638] CONCLUSION Mr. GLENN Exhibit 1 From the Washington Post, Feb. 24, 1990 The French Reactor French President Rejects United States Protest Over Nuclear Plant Sale [Page S3639] Concern Over French Nuclear Deal With Pakistan France Assailed for Nuclear Deal With Pakistan Mitterrand Breaks Taboo in Renewing Nuclear Cooperation With Pakistan (By Rene Slama) From the Washington Times, Feb. 22, 1990 France To Sell Nuclear Plant to Pakistan [Page S3640] From the Washington Post, Feb. 22, 1990 France to Sell Nuclear Power Plant to Pakistan From the Los Angeles Times, Feb. 22, 1990 France to Sell Nuclear Plant to Pakistan France To Supply Nuclear Plant to Pakistan [Page S3641] Pakistan Moves To Settle Nuclear Plant Purchase From the New York Times, Nov. 1, 1989 Clash Erupts on Ways to Halt Spread of Missiles CONCERN OVER ISRAELI ROLE SOME REMAIN UNCONVINCED From the New York Times, Oct. 19, 1989 U.S. Seeks To Stop Brazil's Missile-Technology Deal PACKAGE DEAL FOR TECHNOLOGY [Page S3642] LIMITS ON SHARING TECHNOLOGY U.S. Protests French Plan to Give Brazil Rocket Motor
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Mr. GLENN (for himself and Mr. Boschwitz) submitted the following concurrent resolution; which was referred to the Committee on Foreign Relations:
S. Con. Res. 113
Whereas 140 parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty will assemble in August to deliberate the status of that treaty in its twentieth year of existence;
Whereas section 403 of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978 directs the President to take immediate and vigorous steps to seek agreement from all nations to ensure that IAEA safeguards will be applied to all peaceful nuclear activities in, under the jurisdiction of, or under the control of any non-nuclear-weapon state;
Whereas France, China, and the Soviet Union have recently announced their intentions to sell nuclear reactors to Pakistan and India without any requirement for full-scope international safeguards;
Whereas both of these nations have fought three wars in 43 years and the situation in South Asia remains potentially volatile;
Whereas both nations are continuing research and development activities related to nuclear explosive devices and have in the past used peaceful nuclear technology for such purposes; and
Whereas full-scope international nuclear safeguards benefit the peace and security of all nations: Now, therefore be it
Resolved by the Senate (the House of Representatives concurring), That (a) it is the sense of the Congress that--
(1) the sale or transfer by any nation of nuclear materials and equipment or sensitive nuclear technology to any non-nuclear-weapon state without the requirement of full-scope safeguards will undermine international efforts to halt the regional and global spread of nuclear weapons;
(2) the President should continue his efforts to encourage Pakistan, India, and other non-nuclear-weapon states that are not parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to agree to full-scope safeguards;
(3) the President should urge all current adherents to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to join the United States in seeking these objectives; and
(4) the President should continue and expand his efforts to encourage all nuclear supplier nations to require full-scope safeguards as a condition for future nuclear commerce and cooperation with all non-nuclear-weapon nations.
(b) For purposes of subsection (a)--
(1) the term `non-nuclear-weapon state' is used within the meaning of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, done at Washington, London, and Moscow on July 1, 1968; and
(2) the terms `nuclear materials and equipment' and `sensitive nuclear technology' have the same meanings as are given to such terms in paragraphs (4) and (6), respectively, of section 4(a) of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978.
Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, the French Government announced last month that it is ready and willing to supply a nuclear reactor to Pakistan as part of a broader program of nuclear cooperation to be negotiated over the next few weeks.
I ask unanimous consent to have printed in the Record at the end of my remarks some recent press accounts of this development from around the world, including two notices of official opposition to this deal from the Governments of the United States and Japan.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
(See exhibit 1.)
France's announcement comes in the wake of new Chinese nuclear offers to Pakistan and rumors that even the Soviets are considering a reactor sale. These deals appear to have broken a decade-old international embargo intended to prevent significant nuclear sales to Pakistan until it agrees to safeguard all of its nuclear facilities. In other words, let information be known about all of their facilities. That is basically what safeguards are.
In addition, both France and the Soviet Union appear willing to sell reactors to India, also without any requirement for full-scope safeguards.
The consequences of all of these nuclear deals will extend far beyond South Asia, as pressures will grow among other nuclear supplier nations to abandon full-scope safeguards as a requirement for nuclear commerce. My colleague, Senator Exon summed up France's recent announcement very well in his statement here on March 6, when he said that `* * * the French decision flies in the face of an international approach to controlling the spread of such technology--control which is slowly and dangerously eroding.'
I agree with that assessment. This deal, and others like it, will certainly complicate international efforts to stop the spread of nuclear weapons. Offering nuclear cooperation without full-scope safeguards is bad enough, but offering such technology to two nations that are already engaged in a nuclear arms race is particularly hard to justify, even in the context of the billions of dollars we ourselves are providing to Pakistan. Indeed, our continuing failure to hold Pakistan to its many peaceful nuclear assurances may well have signaled to the world that America would turn a `blind eye' toward new nuclear commerce with Pakistan. That perception needs to be corrected--the time has come to open that eye.
I am not going to use this occasion to remind my colleagues about the specifics of Pakistan's continuing efforts to acquire the bomb, the repeated violations of its solemn nuclear assurances to the United States, or the growing reality of a nuclear arms race in South Asia.
Mr. President, I have discussed these efforts in previous statements over and over again on the floor and expect to address them again and again as developments warrant. I have a list of those times I have risen on the floor. I think there are a dozen or so. I ask unanimous consent they be printed in the Record.
There being no objection, the material was ordered to be printed in the Record, as follows:
[See Cong. Rec., 16 November 1989, p. S15880; 17 November 1989, p. S16103; 22 June 1989, p. S782; 16 May 1989, p. S5437; 18 December 1987, p. S18422; 11 December 1987, p. S17894; 8 October 1987, p. S13919; 3 August 1987, p. S11108; and 8 May 1987, p. S6218.]
Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, however, the decisions by France, the Soviet Union, and China to sell nuclear reactors to mutually hostile nations in South Asia raise two fair questions. First, what difference does it make to us of these deals proceed? And second, what, if anything, can America--in partnership with France and other nuclear supplier nations--do about these growing commercial pressures on the international nuclear nonproliferation regime, pressures which may bring the benefits of nuclear energy to precisely those nations that are the least willing to accept its full responsibilities?
I believe we should be deeply concerned about all of these recent deals, for reasons that go far beyond the secret nuclear activities now underway in Pakistan and India. I would like to discuss some of these reasons.
THE SPOILS OF PROLIFERATION
The United States has for many years urged other nuclear suppliers nations to require their foreign customers to place all of their nuclear facilities under international safeguards--a condition we have required of our own foreign customers ever since enactment of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978.
Mr. President, I was the author of that act in 1978, the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act. We had some choices to be made at that time. There were those in our midst who said the best way to try to control nuclear energy into the future was to let our people sell abroad, sell anywhere, encourage that, get American nuclear industry involved anywhere in the world that we wanted to go, and that way we would know what was going on. I viewed that as a rather defeatist attitude at the time.
On the other hand, there was the proposal that we try to work with foreign governments and say that there be only half a dozen or so basic suppliers of nuclear equipment and technology that could be used to make a bomb and, if we could somehow get those nations to cooperate sufficiently, we could probably for the next 12 or 15 years stop the spread of the equipment and the technology to make nuclear weapons. In that interim time period, we would do our level best to try to negotiate down the stockpiles, vis-a-vis the Soviet Union, and get some agreement on this.
Meanwhile, let us not spread sensitive nuclear technology and nuclear weapons capability to more and more nations around the world, and we ask that other nations follow our lead in not providing that kind of technology and that kind of equipment to other nations around the world.
For nations that would foreswear development of nuclear weapons, we ask them to sign the nonproliferation treaty. That treaty basically says to the United States, `We will cooperate with you in things nuclear if you foreswear going to nuclear weapons, and in return for that, we will try to cooperate with you in all the peaceful benefits of nuclear energy.'
What has been the result of that? I think it has been pretty good. It has not been perfect by a long shot, but we have had some 140 nations sign up under the NPT. It gets reviewed every 5 years. It is up for review again this summer. We have 140 nations that have become parties to that treaty. So I think our policy through the years has had a pretty decent effect on curbing the technology and equipment flow that will permit more and more nations to come into a nuclear weapons capability.
What has happened over those 12 or 15 years? We have found also that, gradually, the technology spread goes on. Gradually this method, this idea, or this concept of how you go about making a nuclear weapon has spread, enough so that if the people have the equipment and a little more technology, we are going to have a breakout of many nations around the world, perhaps, with a nuclear weapons capability.
It is rather ironic that this threat comes at the particular time when we just about have some agreements with the Soviet
Union, finally, to scale down some of the nuclear dangers of the world. That is one reason why I see this as being so important.
The roots of this policy go all the way back to the Acheson/Lilienthal and Baruch plans shortly after World War II, when it was already acknowledged that some form of international controls would be needed over many potentially sensitive steps of the nuclear fuel cycle. For what we viewed as security reasons then, those proposals by Acheson, Lilienthal, and Baruch were not placed into effect.
Over the years, other nations have come to see the wisdom of requiring their nuclear customers to have full-scope safeguards. Japan, for instance, now requires this condition, as do Canada, Australia, Sweden, Norway, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. Even West Germany--a nation that has suffered repeated nuclear export scandals in recent years, including this year--has shown some preliminary signs that it, too, may finally be willing to require its foreign nuclear customers to adopt such controls.
France's action, however, along with the deals announced by the Soviets and the Chinese, jeopardize not just a nuclear embargo to Pakistan--these sales together represent a direct assault on an important long-term goal of the global nuclear nonproliferation regime, an assault that may have produced some new business, but absolutely nothing by way of additional nuclear restraint.
The United States-sponsored international embargo on nuclear sales to Pakistan in particular was established for the simple reason, which surely is no secret to the French, that Pakistan has sought ever since the Indian nuclear test in 1974 to become a nuclear-weapon state; former Prime Minister Ali Bhutto once said that Pakistan would go so far as to `eat grass' to accomplish that aim. Unfortunately, it is Pakistan's poorest citizens who are eating the most grass as the nation continues to divert its scarce resources away from pressing economic development goals in order to acquire bombs. There has surely been no perestroika in Pakistan's nuclear program.
The question is, when a nation takes such steps as Pakistan has taken with its nuclear program, and then complains about an urgent national shortage of electric power, it is then incumbent on foreign suppliers to satisfy that need? The answer is obviously no. Among other goals, nuclear nonproliferation policies seek to raise the cost and expand the time required for additional nations to acquire nuclear weapon capabilities. An international nuclear embargo--even an imperfect one--serves this purpose well by encouraging proliferant nations to reassess the full costs of their nuclear policies.
In other words, the purpose of such a nuclear embargo is not simply to punish, but to offer some real economic and technological incentives for nations to conclude that the bomb is simply not worth its heavy price. The greater the `need' that both Pakistan and India now feel for nuclear energy, the greater will be their incentive to reconsider the costs of their weapon options.
Yet France has recently cited the urgent need for electricity in India and Pakistan as a reason to supply nuclear technology.
Although such an argument may well serve some business and other foreign policy interests, this argument simply does not stand up as a nonproliferation measure. The needs these countries are experiencing merely reflect the costs they are paying for proliferation. By offering nuclear technology to nations that are each actively pursuing weapon options, France, the Soviet Union, and China are simply lowering the costs that both Pakistan and India will have to pay for the bombs in their basements. And once transferred, nuclear know-how and assembled facilities cannot be summoned back home when--once again--solemn commitments are broken.
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LESSONS FROM THE FRENCH CONNECTION
France, of all nations, should know better than to pursue such a course. Much like the United States, Great Britain, West Germany, and other nations with advanced nuclear industries, France has also been victimized by repeated Pakistani efforts to acquire technology and components for its bomb program. A classic example of such procurement efforts was discussed in the book, `The Islamic Bomb,' which chronicled the activities of a certain individual, Mr. S.A. Butt, who, in the authors' words, `* * * would organize Pakistan's surreptitious purchasing network from a little office on the outskirts of Paris, running the most successful foray into nuclear espionage since the Soviet Union set out to penetrate Anglo-American nuclear efforts during and right after World War II.' [Steve Weissman and Herbert Krosney, `The Islamic Bomb,' New York Times Books, 1981, p. 47-48.]
More recently, the technical section of the Pakistani Embassy in Paris has been cited in West German press as involved in assisting an illicit export from West Germany of technology and equipment associated with tritium, a material used in H-bombs. That is right, H-bombs [Welt Am Sonntag, 25 December 1988, p. 1; translated in FBIS-WEU-88-249, 28 December 1988, p. 6.]
Late last year, the West German newsweekly Der Spiegel reported that several tons of zircaloy--a cladding material used in fabricating nuclear fuel--was obtained in France, at a high price, and transshipped to Pakistan through West German intermediaries [Der Spiegel, 6 November 1989, p. 125-131; translated in JPRS-TND-89-022, 29 November 1989, p. 37.]
But France has not been alone in suffering from violations of its nuclear export regulations and other nonproliferation controls. Using United States-origin heavy water and a Canadian reactor--both of which were supplied for peaceful purposes--India produced the plutonium used in its so-called peaceful nuclear explosion in 1974. Having learned a lesson from this experience, both Canada and the United States now require their foreign nuclear customers to have full-scope safeguards.
The Soviets have had their own problems in this area. On June 21, 1988, the Wall Street Journal reported the remarks of a Soviet diplomat acknowledging that in 1985 the Soviet Union may have been duped into illicitly providing heavy water--reportedly to India--by means of a West German intermediary. Yet this apparent disrespect for nonproliferation controls evidently did not discourage the Soviets from entering into a $8 billion industrial agreement with India in November 1988 that included finance for two 1,000-megawatt reactors, without a full-scope safeguards requirement. Earlier that year, the Soviets also leased India a nuclear-powered submarine. So much for the high price of proliferation.
These transactions bring commercial interests into direct competition with international security concerns, a tension that is particularly evident in France's recent deal with Pakistan. France argues that the specific reactor to be exported will be safeguarded, that nuclear sales will only further restrain Pakistan's nuclear ambitions, and that no sensitive nuclear fuel cycle technology will be transferred. The Soviets and Chinese have useds similar arguments to rationalize their current nuclear discussions with India and Pakistan. These arguments, however, need to be weighed against Pakistan's long and well-established record of not living up to its previous nuclear assurances--a record we have discussed over and over and over again with Pakistan--particularly those assurances given to the United States, and against the ample evidence that both South Asian nations are actively pursuing their nuclear weapons options.
The massive aid we provide to Pakistan has led the United States to be justifiably accused in recent months of turning a blind eye to proliferation; at least our blindness is not so severe that it prevents us from seeing the folly in selling nuclear technology to countries actively working on the bomb. Such a policy appears even less responsible coming at a time when the purchasing nations are confronting each other over an ethnic dispute that has led both nations to war more than once in recent history. K. Subrahmanyam, one of India's leading defense analysts, summarized the situation in Kashmir in these words: `Anything is possible when two forces are facing each other and have the history that these two have.' (Reuters, 1 February 1990.)
We should not, therefore, be too reassured by the argument that France and the Soviet Union would, in equanimity, like to sell reactors to India as well. The interests of the international nuclear salesmen appear once again to be ascending over security concerns in the region.
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WITHER THE NPT?
The repercussions of these deals will surely extend beyond the region of South Asia. I am especially concerned about the future of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty [NPT]. Unlike the 140 nations that have become parties to this treaty, France and China not only continue to refuse to join but have even criticized the treaty as being inequitable and contrary to the sacred principle of national sovereignty. Yet if such a view is valid, why then have 140 nations voluntarily chosen to become parties to this agreement? Also, safeguards simply do not inequitably hold back the peaceful development of atomic energy--they are designed instead to hold back the secret development of bombs. That is a significant difference.
These new nuclear deals in South Asia come on the eve of an international conference that will soon take place in Geneva to deliberate the status of the NPT. The eagerness of France, the Soviet Union and China to do nuclear business with non-signatories to the NPT only serves to weaken the international nuclear regime centered on that treaty.
It is unreasonable to expect that some nations which have signed the NPT might begin to wonder if it is worthwhile to remain parties if they can obtain the benefits of nuclear cooperation without the responsibilities of treaty membership? And how long will other nuclear suppliers feel it is in their own commercial interests to sit back and watch France and other nations profit from nuclear sales based on less comprehensive nuclear conditions than these suppliers require of their own customers?
STANDARDS FOR NUCLEAR COOPERATION
There is little doubt that the international nuclear regime is now facing a crisis that no nation can afford to ignore. Under existing standards, all non-nuclear-weapon-states that are party to the NPT must have safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency [IAEA] over all of their nuclear facilities. These controls reassure both the nuclear nations and their buyers' neighbors that nuclear technology will be used exclusively for peaceful purposes. When nuclear cooperation takes place under these controls, all members of international society--not just those involved in specific deals--stand to benefit from the increased security produced by those controls.
Under current French policy, however, nuclear business can evidently continue as usual even if its partner is a nonsignatory of the NPT, even if the partner is operating an unsafeguarded uranium enrichment plant, even if it is building an unsafeguarded nuclear fuel reprocessing plant, even if it is secretly buying up parts for an unsafeguarded plutonium production reactor, even if it is conducting explosive tests of various components of nuclear devices, even if it cannot keep its most solemn nuclear assurances, and even if it is continuing to violate national and international nuclear export controls.
The same policy evidently now applies with respect to the nuclear cooperation standards of the Soviet Union and, of course, China. All three nations have simply brushed aside international criticism of such nuclear supply practices. Purely a domestic affair,' we are told. `Cooperation will only produce further restraint,' they add.
Yet if France is so convinced that Pakistan is committed to its peaceful international nuclear commitments, why then does France not go all the way and sell Pakistan its long-sought nuclear fuel reprocessing plant as well? This is the process of making the fissile material that goes into nuclear weapons. France's evident decision not to supply such a plant raises several interesting questions: Does France not have full confidence in the ability of the IAEA to safeguard a commercial sized nuclear reprocessing plant and the plutonium it produces? Or, does France still harbor some doubts about Pakistan's ability or willingness to live up to its peaceful nuclear commitments? If the later is true, then France's case for selling a reactor is only further eroded.
As France continues to pursue such a policy, pressures will grow among other nuclear supplier nations to follow suit. Since there are many export-hungry nuclear firms in other nations, France's deal could well lead to a global free-for-all in nuclear technology and a further threat to world peace. Is this what we can now expect from the new Europe? Will Pakistan, India, and other nations interested in acquiring nuclear explosives now provide the markets needed to rescue Europe's nuclear industry from the doldrums it is now facing?
History will be the ultimate judge of France's current and past nuclear policies, just as history will judge our own policies. History will judge whether the following activities have truly served the cause of global peace:
Did the French sale of a reactor and highly enriched uranium to Iraq, a nation committed to the total destruction of its neighbor, Israel, and continued talks with the Iraqi Government on supplying a new reactor to replace the Osirak reactor that Israel bombed in 1981, serve the cause of global peace?
Did it serve the cause of global peace for France to transfer technical data for a large nuclear fuel reprocessing plant in Pakistan, a deal that was ultimately terminated in 1977, as a direct result of strong United States opposition?
Or to assist India in building an unsafeguarded breeder reactor to produce large quantities of nuclear materials that could be used in nuclear weapons?
Or to supply to Israel with an unsafeguarded reactor for plutonium production and an unsafeguarded reprocessing plant at the Dimona site for plutonium separation?
Or to supply two large power reactors to South Africa and nuclear fuel services to keep them running?
Or to supply ballistic missile technology to India, Pakistan, and Israel?
RESOLUTION ON FULL-SCOPE SAFEGUARDS
France's apparent decision to resume nuclear sales to Pakistan is thus a test not only of its commitment to halting the global spread of nuclear weapons--it is also a test of our own commitment to that goal. The easy course would be for Congress, once again, to turn a blind eye toward the new specter of proliferation. But we cannot continue to sweep these threats to the international nuclear regime under the carpet year after year without someday having to confront the deadly consequences.
That is why I believe the U.S. Congress should firmly express its concerns about foreign nuclear policies that we see as potentially dangerous to world peace. America must demonstrate its determination to support publicly the principles of nonproliferation that have guided the actions of well over 100 nations in the postwar era, those 140 signers of the Non-Proliferation Treaty. The time has come for the people of the United States to lend some support to our diplomats who have been urging France and other nations for many years not to sell nuclear reactors in South Asia and other regions without full-scope safeguards.
Mr. President, I submit today a sense-of-the-Congress resolution addressing the pending sales of nuclear reactors to South Asia without any requirement for full-scope safeguards.
Mr. President, I am pleased to have as an original cosponsor of this resolution the distinguished chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, Senator Pell, whose long support for nuclear nonproliferation efforts are already well recognized both among his colleagues and across the country.
The preamble identifies several circumstances leading to this resolution. First, it notes that an international meeting will take place later this year to discuss the status of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, an agreement that has for 20 years promoted international peace and security through its provisions relating to full-scope safeguards and the provision of technical assistance on the peaceful uses of atomic energy to all treaty signatories. Second, it recalls section 403 of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978 which directs the President to promote the international acceptance of full-scope international safeguards. Third, it states that France, China, and the Soviet Union have announced their intention to sell reactors to Pakistan and India without full-scope safeguards. Fourth, it notes that both Pakistan and India have gone to war on three occasions in 43 years and that the regional situation remains potentially volatile. Fifth, it acknowledges that each is continuing activities related to the acquisition of nuclear explosive devices, and that each has in the past used peaceful nuclear technology for such purposes. And finally, the preamble affirms that full-scope safeguards benefit the peace and security of all nations.
The body of the resolution states the sense of Congress: First, that the sale by any nation of nuclear materials and equipment or sensitive nuclear technology to nonnuclear weapon nations, without a requirement for full-scope safeguards, will undermine international efforts to halt the regional and global spread of nuclear weapons; second, that the President should continue his efforts to encourage India, Pakistan, and all other non-nuclear weapon states that are not parties to the NPT to agree to full-scope safeguards; third, that the President should urge all parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty to join the United States in pursuing these objectives; and fourth, that the President should continue and expand his efforts to encourage all nuclear supplier nations to require full-scope safeguards as a condition for future nuclear commerce and cooperation.
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THE VALUE OF FULL-SCOPE SAFEGUARDS
I want to be very clear about my intentions in submitting this resolution. I do not expect that the global threat of nuclear proliferation will be eliminated by any magic wand, including full-scope safeguards administered by the International Atomic Energy Agency. Many nations that have agreed to these safeguards--including Iraq, Iran, Libya, and North Korea--still show some interest in acquiring nuclear weapons. Nevertheless, full-scope safeguards have an extremely important role to play in stopping the global race for the bomb.
Take Iraq, for example. Here is a nation that belongs to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, a nation that has agreed to full-scope international safeguards, yet it continues to engage in secret efforts to acquire parts for nuclear weapons. Whether Iraq intended to use these parts at home or to reexport them to its friends in other regions is still an open question.
The fact remains, however, that Iraq is surely acting in violation of the spirit, if not the letter, of its treaty commitments. With an appropriate combination of money, secrecy, profit-hungry middlemen and unscrupulous suppliers of specialized equipment, governments of nuclear-supplier nations that regard nonproliferation as a low-policy priority, and time, Iraq will eventually acquire what it evidently is now seeking--the bomb and a long-range missile to deliver it.
No nation can steal or buy a full-fledged nuclear arsenal on the black market. In fact, the last remaining barrier facing Iraq is its lack of plutonium or high-enriched uranium to support the creation of a nuclear arsenal.
Now just imagine where we would be today if Iraq had no safeguards whatsoever, if international nuclear suppliers were selling Iraq nuclear technology without full-scope safeguards, and if the safeguard windows that now exist in Iraq were slammed shut. Is there anybody who would argue that the world would be a safer place without such safeguards? Of course not.
Safeguards provide that window. They establish a global standard. They are a benchmark for international society to confirm that its members are complying with nonproliferation commitments. They are an arms control verification measure that has no substitute, precedent, or parallel in the international arena. They are invaluable because they target the material that fuels a nuclear arms race--a nation with full-scope safeguards, implemented in accordance with the NPT, cannot build a nuclear arsenal without violating its treaty commitments.
The Iraq example contains many lessons. First, the need for eternal vigilance, even with nations that are party to the NPT; second, the value of tough export controls, aggressively and competently implemented; third, the vital importance of international cooperation in stopping proliferators in their tracks; fourth, the continuing value of full-scope safeguards as a key nonproliferation measure, one of the last remaining legal and technical barriers separating a nation with a potential nuclear capability from a nation with a nuclear arsenal; fifth, the limits of military responses to proliferation--Israel's understandable attack on Iraq's Osirak reactor in 1981 led almost everyone to breathe a sigh of relief; yet, Israel's attack did little to halt Iraqi nuclear weapon ambitions and may well, in fact, have inflamed them; moreover, in striking a safeguarded reactor, Israel also struck at NPT and the very concept of international safeguards; and sixth, the need for greater international sanctions against nations that break their solemn international nuclear commitments--when pledges are broken, a heavy price must be paid.
ADDITIONAL MEASURES NEEDED
Thus, the main purpose of this resolution is to voice the support of Congress for America's ongoing diplomatic efforts to encourage all nuclear-supplier nations to adopt full-scope safeguards as a key condition for exports of nuclear technology
and components. The unstable circumstances we are now facing in South Asia and in other regions where nuclear proliferation threatens calls, however, for something more than just a resolution against these specific transactions. We need to come up with some constructive ideas for new areas where cooperation between nuclear-supplier nations might serve the cause of nuclear nonproliferation.
I urge France to cooperate with its ally, the United States, and not to assist the nuclear programs of nations that are clandestinely using stolen technology in the illicitly obtained equipment to build bombs. There is certainly no shortage of areas where stronger bilateral and multilateral cooperation would be in order. The potential gains from this cooperation far outweigh whatever short-term material benefits that would accrue from new nuclear business with proliferant nations.
Mr. President, I want to offer some suggestions for enhanced cooperation between all nations that are committed to stopping the global spread of nuclear weapons--let us move forward together in the following particular areas:
One. Joint development of low-enriched fuels for civilian research reactors so that bomb-grade fuels can be eliminated entirely from such reactors around the world.
Two. Joint R&D on superefficient lightwater reactors so that the world nuclear power industry can make better use of its uranium resources and reduce the urgency of plutonium use--a lot more collaborative research also needs to be done in the peaceful applications of nuclear fusion technology, in search for a safe means to permanently store spent fuel from our reactors as an alternative to nuclear fuel reprocessing, in the pursuit of superconducting materials to reduce the costs of transmitting electricity from existing power sources, and in improved measures of energy efficiency and conservation.
Three. Expanded joint research on health, safety, and environmental issues, especially at plutonium-handling facilities, so that the full costs of such enterprises can be fully evaluated.
Four. Improvements in information sharing and more collaborative international research to address the global nightmares of nuclear terrorism and proliferation.
Five. Discussions aimed at imposing joint multilateral sanctions--a form of collective nuclear security--against nations that cross the nuclear weapon threshold, even short of nuclear testing.
Six. New efforts to harmonize our respective export controls over dual-use commodities and technical know-how associated with nuclear weapon development and their means of delivery--and encouragement of stiffer domestic penalties for violations of these laws in all nations.
Seven. A renewed international commitment to collaboration in locating and in assessing the disposition of any significant quantities of bomb-usable materials that may have been lost, stolen, or diverted to illicit uses.
Eight. Creation of some common international guidelines or an inspection regime so that the military aircraft exported by both of our nations will not be used for nuclear delivery purposes.
Nine. Expanded joint research into the security of large computers to reduce the risk that they will be misused for purposes of building bombs or their delivery systems.
Ten. Increased national contributions to the IAEA for safeguards research, coupled with a renewed diplomatic commitment by all NPT parties to encourage universal membership in that treaty, and the establishment of an international fellowship program--perhaps in association with the United
Nations--to promote scholarly research on nuclear nonproliferation.
Mr. President, this list provides just a sampling of the areas for enhanced cooperation in the years ahead. The list is not meant to be exhaustive or all-inclusive, and many of these proposals may already be on the agenda.
The immediate task before Congress, however, is to register our concerns about the rapidly deteriorating conditions for nuclear trade in South Asia. Today, I ask my colleagues to join me in voicing sincere concerns about these developments. The time has come to urge the French, Soviet, and Chinese Governments to reconsider their policy of authorizing exports of nuclear reactors to Pakistan, India, or any other nonnuclear weapon nation, without full-scope international nuclear safeguards.
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CONCLUSION
The course I am proposing--a combination of strong opposition to the proposed South Asian nuclear sales with active support for new avenues for multilateral cooperation to stop nuclear proliferation--will surely not eliminate the never-ending global threat of nuclear proliferation. I believe it will, however, accomplish two concrete goals.
It will signal the importance the American people attach to responsible nuclear export policies and to the long-term objective of halting the proliferation of nuclear weapons.
And it will stimulate some thought and action among some of the world's greatest nations about one of the world's most difficult problems.
For these reasons alone, I urge each of my colleagues to voice their concerns about this new challenge we are now facing.
Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that Senator Boschwitz be included as a cosponsor of this resolution.
The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.
Mr. GLENN. Mr. President, I think this is an issue we, too, often take lightly and think is beyond our control. But I cannot look into the future for my children and my grandchildren. I could not look them in the eye and say we did not try, when a nuclear war and even the spectre of nuclear war is so horrible. That has been the objective ever since we worked clear back in 1978 on the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act. The objective was to halt the spread of nuclear weaponry around the world. That is the reason I think resolutions like this one expressing the sense of the Congress, indeed, I feel the sense of the American people, are so important.
Exhibit 1
From the Washington Post, Feb. 24, 1990
The French Reactor
With its decision to sell a nuclear reactor to Pakistan, France has departed from the rules by which the world tries to discourage the spread of nuclear weapons. Pakistan has been working doggedly to build a nuclear bomb. It is determined to achieve nuclear parity with India, which, if it does not already have weapons, is clearly capable of producing them on short notice.
In its defense France can argue that the reactor it sends to Pakistan will be dedicated to peaceful purposes and will be subject to international inspection. Inspections have generally proved effective in preventing the diversion of fuel to military uses. The French reactor will make no direct contribution to the Pakistani bomb.
But it may make indirect contributions. The French reactor will increase the numbers of Pakistanis trained in nuclear technology and raise the level of their sophistication. Less tangibly but perhaps more harmfully, this sale suggests that at least one Western country is prepared to overlook a customer's illicit activities in the nuclear field. That will be extremely helpful to those people who, in the internal debate in Pakistan, argue that there's no need to make concessions to international rules because they aren't enforced.
To the coutrary, they have been enforced fairly well during the years by the countries with nuclear technology to sell. There have been lapses, but on the whole the performance was surprisingly good unitl recently. The general principle is that the advanced countries are not to sell this portentous technology for any purpose to any country that declines to put all of its nuclear facilities--all of them--under international inspection. This principle is getting frayed in the obsessive competition between India and Pakistan. In 1988 the Soviety Union ignored the rules when it sold two reactors to India, which runs many closed and uninspected facilities. Last fall, in a countermove, China said that it would see a reactor to Pakistan. Now France has agreed to provide another--the first Western country in some years to ignore the requirement for full safeguards.
Tension between India and Pakistan is now rising once again over Kashmir. South Asia is becoming a place where a regional nuclear war is not only imaginable but is perhaps more likely than anywhere else. Other countries can't do a great deal to diminish the prospect of that catastrophe, but they have an obligation to do what they can. One thing that they can certainly do is to refuse to sell nuclear technology to countries that, pursuing military ambitions, refuse to open all their nuclear plants to inspection.
French President Rejects United States Protest Over Nuclear Plant Sale
Dhaka, February 23: French President Francois Mitterrand has brushed aside a U.S. protest over the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan.
`If they (the United States) want to protest, let them protest,' Mitterrand, who arrived in Dhaka from Pakistan on Thrusday, told journalists. He did not elaborate.
Mitterrand told a news conference in Islamabad on Wednesday Paris was ready to provide Pakistan with a nuclear power plant under full international safeguards.
He said he had authorised French companies to present an offer quickly for the sale of a nuclear plant in collaboration with one or more foreign firms.
The United States said the sale could provoke a nuclear arms race between India and Pakistan, which have fought three wars and refused to sign a nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
Asked if he also expected India to protest, Mitterrand said: `Of course India would not be pleased. But Pakistan was also not pleased when we sold a nuclear power plant to India in 1982.'
Mitterrand said he did not think Pakistan had the capability of producing an atomic bomb. `They have few elements,' he said, but added `and very good scientists'.
The United States criticised the decision to sell the reactor to Pakistan, saying France should have insisted on fuller safeguards.
The State Department said France had apparently only insisted on Pakistan giving guarantees on the peaceful use of the reactor itself, rather than on full International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards which would have forced the country to give such assurances on its entire nuclear programme.
`We believe that a full-scope safeguards requirement would have made a much more significant contribution to strengthening international non-proliferation efforts in general and in the south Asian region in particular,' the statement said.
U.S. aid to Pakistan is tied to an annual assurance from the President to Congress that Pakistan does not possess a nuclear device.
Washington has frequently warned Pakistan that it views its atomic military research programme as unsafe for the region.
[Page: S3639]
Concern Over French Nuclear Deal With Pakistan
Tokyo, March 8: The Japanese Foreign Ministry on Thursday conveyed its concern to France over its sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan without Pakistan's agreement to open all its nuclear facilities for international inspection, officials said. Hiroshi Ota, director general for science and technology affairs, summoned to the ministry of French Minister Jean-Jacques Subrenat to file Japan's concern.
Ota noted that the French nuclear sale to Pakistan, which is not a member of the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, did not ensure a full-scope safeguard inspection of the facilitiy and expressed concern over the lack of such safeguards, the officials said.
Japan withholds nuclear cooperation to nonmembers of the nonproliferation treaty, which obliges signatories to conclude a separate safeguard agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAES) within 18 months.
Japan is also worried because it is difficult to monitor the management of used nuclear fuels in nations which are not members of the treaty and are not legally bound by the full-scope safeguard inspections, ministry sources said. Japan cannot remain indifferent to these situations, the sources said, referring also to the ministry's recent call to North Korea to allow outside inspection of its nuclear facilities.
The treaty signatories, which have emphasized nuclear arms reduction until now, will likely shift their attention to the issue of peaceful usage of nuclear power when they meet in August in Geneva, the sources said. The member nations gather once in five years to study implementation of the treaty.
French President Francois Mitterrand said in Pakistan last month that his Government has authorized French industrial firms to make technical and commercial offers to sell a 900 megawatt rector.
Pakistan has tried to set up a nuclear power plant since 1982, but none of the leading suppliers of nuclear technology have submitted bids due to American pressure for Pakistan to sign the nonproliferation treaty. France, one of the five advanced nuclear nations, is not a member of the treaty.
France Assailed for Nuclear Deal With Pakistan
President Francois Mitterrand's approval of a nuclear plant for Pakistan provoked a storm of protest from environmentalists on Thursday, and a U.S. official said Washington would keep a close watch on the deal.
Mitterrand, who is touring Asia, announced on Wednesday that Paris would provide Pakistan with a nuclear power station and settle a dispute over a previous nuclear deal. He told reporters the plant would be under full international safeguards.
Asked if he believed Pakistan's assurances that it was not producing nuclear weapons, Mitterrand said he had `decided to show full confidence in Pakistan.'
The French Greens party said in a statement on Thursday that underdeveloped Pakistan had no need of a nuclear industry. `This 105.4 in 1988--needs pills, not the atomic bomb,' it added.
Ronald Lehman, director of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, told a satellite news conference on Thursday the United States was not opposed to the peaceful use of nuclear power but added: `We have concerns about the possibility of an arms race in south Asia and we are uring restraint.'
`We will be watching this extremely closely,' Lehman said in Washington.
The Paris daily Le Monde quoted a U.S. spokesman as saying Islamabad had offered France insufficient safeguards.
Pakistan is widely believed to be developing nuclear weapons, and U.S.-led Western pressure forced Paris to cancel a contract to supply a nuclear reprocessing plant in 1978.
The bomb fear was echoed on Thursday by the ultra-right French opposition party, the National Front.
`The whole region is tense . . . we should not give certain countries, often unstable, the means for future adventure,' party leader Jean-Marie Le Pen told a news conference.
The environmentalist group Robin Hood said it planned to mobilize a protest against what it called Mitterrand's role as a `travelling salesman' of the nuclear industry.
`We are rather shocked, worried and disappointed to see that each time Mitterrand travels abroad, it is always to sell a nuclear plant,' said spokesman Jacky Bonnemains.
France is currently involved in nuclear projects in China, Hungary and the Soviet Union. It completed its first plant in 1956 and now builds a French adaptation of a U.S.-designed pressurized water reactor.
Industry sources said the Pakistani contract would be executed by Framatome, which built South Africa's two pressurized water reactors and one in South Korea.
Bonnemains said environmentalists were concerned not so much by military implications as by how a Third World country could handle waste from such plants. `Pakistan is badly organized in terms of coping with risks,' he said.
Mitterrand Breaks Taboo in Renewing Nuclear Cooperation With Pakistan
(By Rene Slama)
Islamabad, February 22: French President Francois Mitterrand has broken a long-standing taboo by agreeing to relaunch nuclear cooperation with Pakistan after more than a decade of U.S. and Indian pressure to steer clear.
The French Leader's announcement here Wednesday, described as a `historic decision' by Pakistan Prime Minister Benazia Bhutto, has already triggered a negative reaction from the United States.
Mr. Mitterrand told a joint press conference with Ms. Bhutto that he would sanction the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan, ending speculation over the issue since his three-day official visit started Monday.
The offer would `be in accordance with the international regulations, including controls and guarantees, which apply to any export of nuclear plants and materials,' he said.
Asked about concerns that Islamabad would develop a nuclear weapons program, he said: `We have decided to show confidence in Pakistan.'
In Washington, the State Department reacted to the announcement by saying France had no assurances the plant would not be put to military use.
`France has apparently agreed to sell a nuclear reactor to Pakistan without requiring that Pakistan accept full-scope IAEA safeguards on all nuclear activities in Pakistan, not just on the item being exported,' spokesman Adam Shub said.
He said the United States opposed foreign assistance for civil nuclear programs in countries which have no nuclear weapons unless they accept all safeguards adopted by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).
`We have urged that all nuclear supplier states adopt a similar nuclear export policy,' he added.
The pro-government Pakistan Times on Thursday greeted the announcement with an eight-column banner headline: `France to give nuclear power plant.' A subhead read, `Deal pledged having full confidence in Pakistan's peaceful plan: Mitterrand.'
The story eclipsed the Pakistan hockey team's victory in the World Cup semi-finals.
From the Washington Times, Feb. 22, 1990
France To Sell Nuclear Plant to Pakistan
Islamabad, Pakistan: French President Francois Mitterrand announced yesterday that he has approved the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan, ending a 14-year ban on French sales of nuclear energy to this country.
Mr. Mitterrand said at a news conference that `France pledges to authorize French industrial enterprises . . . to make rapidly a technical and commercial offer for the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan.'
He did not say how big the plant would be.
Mr. Mitterrand, on a four-day visit to Pakistan, is the first French leader to visit the country in 25 years. He leaves for Bangladesh tomorrow.
Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto said a French-supplied plant would be `open to all international safeguards and monitoring teams.'
Pakistan, however, is not a signatory to the international nuclear nonproliferation treaty and refuses to sign it unless India does.
Pakistan must convince Washington each year that it does not have a nuclear weapon before Washington frees millions of dollars in loans. Mrs. Bhutto has often said Pakistan does not have a nuclear weapon, nor does it want to produce one.
`Pakistan is not trying to enter into a nuclear arms race,' she said again yesterday, adding that Islamabad has pressed India to sign a regional nuclear weapons test ban. India has refused.
Mr. Mitterrand's announcement only vaguely referred to a 14-year-old dispute between Pakistan and France over a promised sale of a nuclear reprocessing plant.
France reneged on the deal because of U.S. pressure to drop the sale unless Pakistan agreed to sign international nuclear treaties and open its nuclear facilities to international monitoring teams.
Pakistan lodged a variety of complaints until a French arbitration board ruled in its favor and ordered Paris to pay a fine. No figure was ever disclosed, but Pakistani media have cited figures ranging from $250 million to $400 million.
[Page: S3640]
From the Washington Post, Feb. 22, 1990
France to Sell Nuclear Power Plant to Pakistan
New Delhi, February 21: France has approved the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan, ending a 14-year embargo that was enacted partly in response to U.S. fears that Pakistan might use such technology to build a nuclear bomb.
French President Francois Mitterrand announced the sale today in Islamabad, the Pakistani capital, where he was concluding a four-day visit. Mitterrand and Pakistani Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto said the French-supplied plant would be used only for commercial purposes and be subject to international safeguards and monitoring.
Nonetheless, the sale is certain to renew fears in the United States and other countries about Pakistan's nuclear program and about the possibility of a nuclear arms race between Pakistan and India, which have fought three wars during the last four decades. Neither India nor Pakistan is a signatory of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty enacted in 1968 to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.
The French announcement comes as relations between Pakistan and India are at their lowest ebb in several years because of a flare-up in a long-running dispute over the northern Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. The dispute has generated harsh rhetoric, border skirmishes and sometimes violent demonstrations in both Pakistan and India.
India detonated a nuclear explosive device in its northwestern desert in 1974 but has said since then that it does not possess nuclear weapons and has no plans to build them. India's contention is generally accepted in the West, but U.S. specialists believe the country has the capability to build a substantial number of nuclear bombs in a short period should it choose to undertake such a program.
Pakistan never has tested a nuclear explosive, but since the successful Indian test 16 years ago, it has embarked on an aggressive and at times clandestine program to develop nuclear technology. Pakistani nationals have been convicted twice during the 1980s in U.S. courts of attempting to smuggle out of the United States sophisticated technology that could be used in the construction of a nuclear bomb.
Partly because of these court cases, the United States has made its large sums of aid to Pakistan--more than $500 million annually--contingent on a public guarantee by Pakistan that it does not possess nuclear weapons. While Pakistan has continued to assure the United States that it has adhered to this condition, some U.S. officials have said they believe Pakistan has developed the technology to construct a small number of nuclear bombs.
Prime Minister Bhutto reiterated today that Pakistan has no nuclear weapons and no plans to build them. `Pakistan is not trying to enter into a nuclear arms race,' she told reporters in Islamabad.
Pakistan already has one small nulcear power plant near the southern port city of Karachi. The plant was constructed by Canadian firms and is subject to international nuclear safeguards, although there have been some reports of inspection and monitoring problems in the past.
With few fossil fuels and limited hydroelectric resources, Pakistan has been hampered by chronic shortages of electricity even as its economy has expanded rapidly in recent years. Oil imports drain a substantial portion of the country's foreign exchange, and Pakistani politicans, including Bhutto, have said commercial nuclear power is essential to meet development needs.
President Jimmy Carter cut off all aid to Pakistan during the late 1970s and urged allies such as France to halt nuclear sales because of fears about the Pakistani nuclear program. After the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, the United States resumed aid at higher levels than before because Pakistan was seen as a critical ally in the U.S. effort to contain Soviet expansion. The Afghan rebels who helped to expel Soviet troops from Afghanistan last year are mainly based in Pakistan.
From the Los Angeles Times, Feb. 22, 1990
France to Sell Nuclear Plant to Pakistan
Paris: Breaking ranks with its Western allies on the issue of nuclear proliferation in the Third World, France on Wednesday approved the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan, a country many experts believe has an active nuclear weapons development program.
In a joint press conference in Islamabad with Pakistani Prime Minister Donazir Bhutto, French President Francois Mittorrand announced, `France is committed to authorize French industrial enterprises, in possible cooperation with one or several foreign partners, to make a technical and commercial offer for the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan.'
Mitterrand, on a four-day visit to Pakistan, added that the offer is `subject to international norms and, notably, controls and guarantees that apply to all exportation of nuclear material.
Bhutto agreed that the plant will be `open to all international safeguards and monitoring teams.'
However, since 1974, when neighboring India exploded its own nuclear device in the Rajasthan desert, Pakistan has been accused of numerous violations of national and international laws involving the export of nuclear weapons materials in an apparent race to match its archrival.
Because of fears regarding Pakistan's weapons program, the U.S. government in 1978 persuaded France to halt construction of a plutonium extraction plant that a French company had contracted to build and for which the Pakistanis had already partly paid. During Mitterrand's visit, the issue of the canceled contract and the money has been a key test for the shaky Bhutto government.
Both Pakistan and India have refused to sign the international agreement on nulcear non-proliferation. Since 1980, when West Germany agreed to build a nuclear power plant in Argentina, all Western countries possessing nuclear tochnology, including France and the United States, have maintained an unofficial embargo against selling larger-scale nuclear projects to all countries in the Third World that have not signed the treaty.
`There were no sales of reactors and no major nuclear fuel contracts by Western countries since 1980,' said Leonard Spector, a specialist on nuclear proliferation with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace in Washington. Interviewed by telephone, Spector contended that the French proposal, although couched in terms of international safety and inspection procedures, would contribute to a dangerously escalating spread of materials that could be used in the making of nuclear weapons.
`Coming after all we know about Pakistan's nuclear program' Spector said, `It is surprising to see a European country break ranks with other suppliers and make a sale that appears to condone the Pakistan behavior.,'
At its nuclear research facility in Kahuta, near Islamabad, Pakistani scientists are believed to have developed a uranium enrichment plant that is capable of isolating an isotope found in normal uranium and concentrating it into weapons-grade material. They have also been accrued of using another small reactor, supplied by the United States to produce trilium, another material used in nuclear weapons.
Since 1980, Pakastanis or suspected Pakistani agents have been charged in the United States and several European countries with attempting to smuggle materials that could be used in nuclear weapons development. In 1985, Pakistani Nazir Vaid was arrested in Houston for attempting to smuggle high-speed switches used in nuclear weapons to his country.
Some doomsday scenarios about a future nuclear war began in the India Pakistan region. In recent weeks, in fact, the two countries have been involved in a heated war of words and sober-rattling over Kashmir, a mountainous region with a mostly Muslim population. Pakistan controls the northern part of the region and India the southern part. The issue has been at the heart of two wars between the countries.
However, Spector noted that France follows the Soviet Union and China in pledging nuclear projects in the region. In 1988, the Soviet Union, which until then had participated in the unofficial embargo of developing countries that have not signed the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, agreed to sell India two nuclear power plants. The agreement was subject to international inspection, and the Soviets added the unusual provision that they would take back all the spent nuclear fuel so that it could not be converted into weapons-grade material.
Late last year, the Chinese government offered to assist Pakistan in the construction of two nuclear power plants. Many believe the Chinese have been involved in Pakistan's efforts to build nuclear weapons, particularly in the technology for a missile delivery system.
France is second in the world behind the United States in the use of nuclear power for generating electricity--in fact, it derives a larger percentage of its power from nuclear facilities than does the United States--and has a highly developed industry known for its aggressive sales in sometimes controversial settings.
The French nuclear industry, for example, assisted in the contruction of the Iraqi nuclear power plant that was destroyed by Israeli jets in a 1981 raid after the government of then-Prime Minister Menachem Begin asserted that Iraq planned to use the facility to develop nuclear weapons, the so-called Islamic bomb.
France To Supply Nuclear Plant to Pakistan
Islamabad, Pakistan: French President Francois Mitterrand announced Wednesday that France will provide a nuclear power plant to Pakistan, honoring an agreement signed 14 years ago despite fears Islamabad may be developing nuclear weapons.
`We have decided to show full confidence in Pakistan,' Mitterrand told a joint news conference with Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto on the third day of a four-day visit.
He announced that under an agreement signed Wednesday with Pakistan, `France pledges to authorize French industrial enterprises . . . to make rapidly a technical and commercial offer for the sale of a nuclear power plant to Pakistan.
`This offer will be in accordance with the international regulations, including controls and guarantees which apply to any export of nuclear plants and materials,' he said.
Mitterrand said the terms of the deal will be discussed later, `but the political decision has been taken.'
France agreed in 1976 to build a 900-megawatt nuclear processing plant at Chasma in Pakistan's Northwest Frontier Province, but reneged on the deal two years later under U.S. pressure after reports Islamabad planned to build a nuclear bomb.
Pakistan had demanded France honor the deal and pay millions of dollars in compensation, including interest on a down payment of $200 million. Wednesday's agreement said the two countries would seek an `amicable settlement' on the issue of compensation.
Pakistan already has one Canadian-built 137-megawatt nuclear power plant. China promised in November to build a 300-megawatt facility to help meet the country's chronic energy shortage.
Islamabad also has a uranium enrichment laboratory but has denied reports it is using it to build a nuclear bomb. It has refused to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which would require international inspection of the plant, unless arch-rival India also does so.
France has supplied nuclear powerplants to a number of countries, including India, South Korea and China, but orders have declined recently due to environmentalist lobbies.
Bhutto, calling the agreement `historic,' denied it would lead to a further deterioration in relations with India, already tense over a month-old uprising in the Indian state of Jammu and Kashmir. India has accused Pakistan of backing the militants, charges Islamabad denies.
`I don't think the decision will lead to further tensions because it is under international safeguards and it will be monitored,' she said.
Mitterrand said France `sold a nuclear power station to India so I don't see why it would be so scandalous to supply one to Pakistan.'
Mitterrand also announced France will lend Pakistan about $30 million to help with its energy shortage.
[Page: S3641]
Pakistan Moves To Settle Nuclear Plant Purchase
Islamabad, January 31: Pakistan Foreign Secretary Tanvir Ahmad left Tuesday for Paris to finalize arrangements for buying a 900-megawatt nuclear power plant from France.
Pakistan has been trying to acquire the 900-megawatt nuclear powerplant from France since 1982, but the deal reportedly has been opposed by the United States, which wants Pakistan to sign a nuclear nonproliferation treaty or allow international inspection of all its nuclear facilities.
However, the directer general of the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency said at a press conference in Islamabad earlier this month that according to his information, the sale of the 900-megawatt nuclear powerplant to Pakistan has been held up only because of financial snags.
Finance Minister Ehsan Ul-Haq Piracha had paid a secret visit to Riyadh last week, apparently to seek financial support from the Saudi Arabian Government. It was Saudi Arabia which had paid the down payment for a nuclear fuel reprocessing plant contracted by late Prime Minister Zulfikar Ali Bhutto and unilaterally canceled by France in 1978.
The government of Prime Minister Benazir Bhutto has already concluded an agreement for acquiring a 300-megawatt nuclear powerplant from China in November this year.
From the New York Times, Nov. 1, 1989
Clash Erupts on Ways to Halt Spread of Missiles
Washington, October 31: The Bush Administration expressed opposition today to legislation to impose sanctions against companies contributing to the spread of ballistic missiles.
Richard A. Clark, Assistant Secretary of State for Politico-Military Affairs, told the Senate Foreign Relations Committee that the adoption of such legislation would hamper the Administration's efforts to stop the spread of missile proliferation through diplomatic means.
But Congressional supporters of sanctions legislation rejected the Administration's arguments, saying that the United States needed to take a tougher stand against the spread of ballistic missiles.
`Exhortation and quiet negotiations may be useful, but exhortation cannot replace sanctions,' said Senator John McCain, an Arizona Republican who is co-sponsoring a sanctions bill along with Senator Albert Gore Jr., Democrat of Tennessee.
In an unusually blunt statement, a Pentagon official acknowledged publicly that the United States was trying to stop France from selling rocket technology to Brazil and India and was concerned about Israel's continuing cooperation with South Africa's missile program.
`We have taken a strong stand against the proposed French sale of liquid rocket propulsion technology to Brazil and India for their space launch vehicle programs,' Henry Sokolski, acting deputy for nonproliferation policy at the Pentagon, told the committee.
CONCERN OVER ISRAELI ROLE
Mr. Sokolski added that reports of Israeli assistance to South Africa were `a matter of serious concern at the highest levels' of the Defense Department. He added the Defense Department had `discussed the possibility of Israeli-South African collaboration at the highest levels with the Israeli Ministry of Defense.'
Mr. Sokolski said that the Pentagon was considering a proposal to suspend contracts with foreign companies that fail to comply with export controls intended to stem the spread of ballistic missiles.
But Mr. Clark of the State Department, Mr. Sokolski of the Pentagon and officials from the Commerce Department and Arms Control and Disarmament Agency said that sanctions legislation could hurt the Administration's efforts to work with other nations to stop missile proliferation.
`The possibility that the U.S. might act unilaterally against a foreign firm or country could seriously hamper the information-sharing mechanism,' set up by Western industrialized nations to stop missile proliferation, Mr. Clark said.
`Partners who might wish to consult with us on missile-related activities of their own companies would be unlikely to do so if the result would be to invite U.S. sanctions against those companies,' he added.
Mr. Clark asserted that the Administration already had sufficient authority to penalize American and foreign companies and foreign countries that contribute to missile proliferation.
SOME REMAIN UNCONVINCED
Mr. Clark's arguments did not appear to sway Congressional backers of sanctions.
`Congress must act to make illegal traffic in these technologies very hazardous to the pocketbooks of certain kinds of corporations and their subsidaries,' Senator Gore said.
Despite the Administration complaints and Congressional avowls of tough action, the scope of some proposed legislation appeared to be limited.
Under the legislation proposed by Senators McCain and Gore, a company in a foreign country that is cooperating with the United States to restrain the spread of ballistic missiles could be banned from contracting with the United States for two to five years if the company violated its Government's export laws by selling banned missile technologies.
Such legislation would not appear to apply to possible sles of rocket technology to Brazil by Arianespace, the French company, because such a transaction will only occur if it is approved by the French Government. French officials say that no final decision to approve such a sale has been made, but they maintain that such a transaction is consistent with international export guidelines.
From the New York Times, Oct. 19, 1989
U.S. Seeks To Stop Brazil's Missile-Technology Deal
Washington, October 18: The Bush Adminsitration has begun a campaign to dissuade France from selling Brazil rocket-motor technology that American officials say could be used to make ballistic missiles.
Administration officials say the sale of the technology, which is intended for Brazil's space program, would be a major setback to Western efforts to stem the spread of ballistic missiles to the third world.
The Bush Administration has protested to the French Government against the sale and a team of State Department officials flew to Paris last week to underscore American concerns, officials said today. Britain and West Germany have also expressed concerns over the sale, Western diplomats said.
A spokesman for the French Embassy here acknowledged that France was considering the sale of missile technology to Brazil but said that no final dicisions had been made.
PACKAGE DEAL FOR TECHNOLOGY
The dispute between Paris and Washington arose when Brazil solicited bids this year from Arianespace, a French company, and McDonnell Douglas, the American company, for the launching of two communications satellites. As part of a package deal, Brazil also sought rocket technology so that it could develop its own capability to launch satellites.
In an effort to win the sale, Arianespace presented a proposal that called for the transfer of technology for the Viking rocket motor, a liquid-fueled rocket motor that is used in the Arianespace launching vehicle, according to a spokesman for the Brazilian Embassy here.
McDonnell Douglas did not offer missile technology, a company spokesman said. Instead, the American company told Brazil that it was willing to give Brazilian engineering a chance to work on the space shuttle, a company said. McDonnell Douglas said it was also willing to pay the cost of educating two Brazilian engineers in the United States in propulsion technology.
[Page: S3642]
LIMITS ON SHARING TECHNOLOGY
A spokesman for the Brazilian Embassy there said that Brazil favors the French proposal but added that no final decision had been made.
Bush Administration officials asset that the proposed French sale would undercut a 1987 understanding among Western nations intended to stem the spread of ballistic missiles.
That understanding states that international cooperation on space programs is allowed `as long as such programs could not contribute to nuclear weapons delivery systems,' like ballistic missiles.
Bush Administration officials said the missile technology should not be provided to the Brazilian space program because Brazil has a history of deriving military rockets from its civilian space program. They said they did not believe that effective safeguards could be worked out to insure that the rocket technology provided to the Brazilian space programs does not find its way to the Brazilian military and through arms sales, to the Middle East.
French officials, however, denied that France was undercutting the pact.
A French Embassy spokesman said that the 1987 agreement explicitly allowed the transfer of technology in some instances and said that France would provide rocket-engine technology to Brazil only if adequate safeguards were worked out to insure that it is used for peaceful purposes.
If a decision is made to provide the technology to Brazil, it will be transferred in stages, the spokesman said. That will enable Paris to cut off the technology if it is being misused by the Brazilians, he said.
A spokesman for Brazil's Embassy insisted that Brazil would not use the Viking rocket motor technology for military ends. The technology, the spokesman said, is for the `peaceful space industry in Brazil, which we think we have a right to do.'
U.S. Protests French Plan to Give Brazil Rocket Motor
Washington: Despite strong U.S. protests, the French government plans to trade Brazil sensitive rocket technology that could be used by U.S. enemies to make ballistic missiles, government and industry officials said Thursday.
France has promised to give Brazil the technology of a liquid fuel motor called Viking, which powers the Ariane space launch vehicle, the officials said. In return, the French company Arianespace would be awarded a $60 million contract for the launch of two Brazilian communications satellites, they added.
The U.S. officials, who spoke only on condition of anonymity, said French President Francois Mitterrand personally made the decision to give the technology to Brazil, promising that safeguards would be placed to prevent use of the motor for lethal purposes.
But a statement issued by the government in Paris denied a final decision had been made. `The definitive contract will be submitted to the government for approval and this contract has not yet been given' to the government, the statement said.
`This contract will have to follow certain purposes and restrictions regarding technology transfers,' it said.
The United States, however, is doubtful such safeguards can be implemented effectively.
`If someone like Libya wants to use this motor to harmful purposes, who will stop them?' asked one official.
Libya has been seeking to buy from Brazil equipment and know-how in an effort to develop a ballistic missile arsenal capable of delivering chemical weapon warheads, according to U.S. experts.
Brazil, one of an estimated 20 Third World countries which have some form of ballistic missile capability, has been exporting some missile technology while and attempting to develop a more accurate and sophisticated arsenal of its own.
Word of the planned French sale was first reported by Signal magazine, published by the Armed Forces Communications and Electronic Association.
Representatives of McDonnell Douglas Corp., the St. Louis-based firm competing for the Brazilian launch contract against Arianespace, were informed of the French proposal by Brazilian officials and conveyed the information to the Defense Department, officials said.
A spokesman for McDonnell Douglas, Bob O'Brien, said that if the French `transfer is made, obviously it wouldn't enhance our chances' to win the contract. He said Brazil had been expected to announce its decision already but has not done so yet.
The United States first protested the planned French sale last July during the seven-nation economic summit in Paris, one official said.
For awhile it appeared the protest had stopped the French plan, the official said. But the French government reconsidered when it appeared France stood to lose the lucrative satellite launch contract, he said.
The United States has warned France the technology transfer would violate the Missile Technology Control Regime, a 1987 agreement to stem the proliferation of such weapons, of which France is a signatory, the official said.
But France contends the Viking motor will be used for peaceful purposes and would not violate the agreement.
The United States is still reviewing whether it can stop the deal, the official said.
END
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