ISLAMABAD: Pakistan on Wednesday denied reports in a section of the media that it had petitioned the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) against the India-U.S. nuclear deal on civilian nuclear energy.

"We have not written any letter to the NSG and reports in the media on the subject are wrong," Pakistan's Foreign Office spokesperson Tasneem Aslam said. However she conceded that Islamabad was in touch with members of the NSG on implications of the India-U.S. deal as well as Pakistan's own nuclear power requirements.

Ms. Aslam said Pakistan had taken a clear position on the recently concluded civil nuclear cooperation between New Delhi and Washington.

She said Pakistan viewed the India-U.S. nuclear deal as discriminatory and wanted it to be given as a package deal to meet its energy requirements.

The spokesperson maintained that Pakistan has close ties with a number of NSG-member countries and interacted with them at various levels about their stand on the India-U.S. nuclear deal but it had not written any letter in this regard to NSG members.

She argued that the objective of strategic stability in South Asia and the global non-proliferation regime would have been better served if the United States had considered a package approach for Pakistan and India as both have not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

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