— Photo: Vino John

SPOTLIGHT ON NUCLEAR DEAL: CPI(M) General Secretary Prakash Karat (second from left) seen with T. K. Rangarajan, central committee member (extreme left), and N. Varadarajan, State Secretary, at a public meeting in Chennai on Monday.

CHENNAI: The Communist Party of India(Marxist) general secretary, Prakash Karat, on Monday said that his party had "serious criticisms" of the military cooperation agreement and also the "overall approach and content" of the recent joint statement signed at the end of the Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's visit to the United States.

"There was a clear provision made in the Common Minimum Programme that India will pursue an independent foreign policy. Secondly, India will play a role in world relations that will promote multi-polarity... Our disappointment is that this India-U.S. defence agreement in particular goes against the provisions... of the Common Minimum Programme," he said and added that it was not an agreement that took into consideration India's security interests.

"What is there in this defence framework agreement is how the U.S. would like to involve India in its military strategy which will help them to contain China... America's strategic goals in Asia are sought to be met through this agreement."

Mr. Karat said that India should not accept any strategic alliance that restricted its independent role in world affairs. He also warned against India making any "unilateral concessions" to the U.S. merely because it was offered military hardware or support for the civilian nuclear programme. Many of the provisions of the defence agreement would end up fuelling an arms race between India and Pakistan, he said.

Through the agreement, the U.S. had tried to make India a strategic ally to carry out its designs in Asia, he said and added that this was only a continuation of the policies of the earlier National Democratic Alliance Government. The NDA wanted India recognised as a country with nuclear weapons at any cost and was prepared to do anything for the U.S., he charged and added that the act of the Indian Navy escorting U.S. warships across the Malacca Straits and the Strobe Talbott-Jaswant Singh meetings in third countries only went to prove the extent of India's desperation. These led to India "being converted virtually into a junior partner of the United States," he said.

Reservations

The party also had reservations about the nuclear cooperation agreement signed with the U.S., he said, addressing a public meeting organised here on `India's nuclear policy and Indo-U.S. agreement.' He made it clear that his party wanted India to have a "good," "balanced and equitable relationship" with the U.S.

"There must be a degree of equal status in relations." Any agreement should not hamper India's civilian nuclear research and development, he said and added that his party agreed with the view that the civilian and military applications of nuclear energy should be bifurcated.

The CPI (M) has decided to hold a public campaign and debate on the recent agreements and will hold meetings in all State capitals and urge people to think about the issues so that the Centre would take note of the reservations, he said.

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