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Remember lessons from Tarapur

M.R. Srinivasan

Indian negotiators must insist that the 123 agreement recognise India's sovereign right to reprocess nuclear fuel imported from any country and to use it in safeguarded facilities. Otherwise, the country's civil nuclear energy programme will be tied solely to imported uranium.

AFTER PRESIDENT George W. Bush signed the United States-India nuclear cooperation bill, he called up Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to tell him how pleased he was at this development. While welcoming this event, the Prime Minister took the opportunity to tell the President that there remained areas of concern that needed to be addressed during the negotiation of the bilateral agreement (called the 123 agreement, after the relevant clause number in the U.S. Atomic Energy Act, 1954). The U.S. has entered into some twenty-five 123 agreements with various countries, including the one concerning Tarapur. The Tarapur agreement concluded in 1963 was unique in that it guaranteed supplies of enriched uranium fuel from the U.S. for running the Tarapur reactors for their entire life. However, after 1978 the U.S. did not supply fuel saying its domestic legislation (under the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act) prevented it from doing so. India argued that Tarapur was an inter-governmental agreement and hence it had to be honoured by the U.S. But to no avail. However, later, the U.S. allowed France to supply fuel to India. Subsequently, the USSR (now Russia) and even China supplied fuel for Tarapur.

The lesson from the Tarapur episode is that the U.S. breached with impunity even a cast-iron guarantee it had furnished. Considerable bitterness grew between the U.S. and India and extended to many other areas beyond the nuclear one. When India agreed, reluctantly, in March 2006 to put imported reactors under "safeguards in perpetuity," the U.S. consented to the Indian insistence on assurances of fuel supply. This meant India could build up a stockpile of fuel to tide over disruption in supply and the U.S. would agree to work with other countries namely Russia, France, and Britain to arrange alternate supplies. The U.S. legislation, based on the Hyde Bill, forbids India building up a stockpile of nuclear fuel. It also obligates the U.S. administration to work with other Nuclear Supplier Group countries to get them to suspend supplies to India, if the U.S. has done so under some provision of the Hyde Bill. It is not evident how the U.S. can address the legitimate concerns of India on continued fuel supply, given the boundaries set by the Hyde Bill.

With regard to future nuclear tests, the Prime Minister has said India is only committed to a voluntary moratorium. A moratorium is only a temporary holding off of an activity, conditioned by specific circumstances that obtained at the time when such a declaration was made. It cannot be construed as a permanent ban. The Hyde Bill has sought to make the moratorium into a permanent ban. However, there is no such restraint imposed on the U.S., China, Pakistan or any other country. In bringing up this issue, I do not wish to suggest that I favour a resumption of tests by India. But India cannot prevent other countries from carrying out tests. It is, therefore, unacceptable that India forfeits its right to test for all time to come under the agreement with the U.S. Even if the 123 agreement is silent on the issue, Indian negotiators must put this issue on the table. The Hyde Bill calls for suspension of all cooperation and fuel supplies and even calls for return of all equipment and materials supplied earlier in the event of a test. It baffles one how India can return reactor installations that might have been operated a few years were such a contingency to arise in future.

The differences over the definition of "full civilian nuclear cooperation" have been discussed in the media. The Indian understanding was that reprocessing of spent fuel, enrichment of uranium, and production of heavy water also formed part of the term "full civilian nuclear cooperation." In the congressional debate, it has been noted that these were construed by the U.S. to be in the nature of military activities and not civilian. India's future plans for thorium utilisation for civil nuclear power depend crucially on reprocessing.

Similarly, civil nuclear power units using natural uranium require heavy water as reactor coolant and moderator.

Equally if India were to embark on a sizeable light water reactor programme, it may like to have control on supply of enriched uranium for economic and supply security reasons. India has technologies of its own in these areas and will develop them further in the years ahead. If the Indo-U.S. agreement moves ahead in the manner its sponsors have speculated, in a few decades from now some 90 per cent of the nuclear installations in India would be open to International Atomic Energy Agency inspections. In that scenario, how can India reconcile to the embargo from nuclear advanced countries on the export of enrichment, reprocessing, and heavy water technologies? Even if the issue were to be papered over now, it will then look from India's point of view to have been a very bad bargain.

There is the important question of India's right to reprocess imported nuclear fuel, enriched uranium or natural uranium, for use in future reactors. The Tarapur experience is relevant to recall. The 123 agreement recognised India's right to reprocess the spent fuel; the residual uranium and plutonium could then be used as fuel at Tarapur or elsewhere in safeguarded reactors. But is reality, the U.S. never issued its consent on reprocessing. The agreement had stated that the consent "shall not be withheld unreasonably." Indeed the U.S. did withhold its consent "unreasonably."

Indian negotiators must insist that the 123 agreement recognise India's sovereign right to reprocess nuclear fuel, whether enriched or natural uranium, imported from any country and to use such fuel in safeguarded facilities. Unless India has access to using such separated plutonium in civilian fast breeder and thorium burning systems, the civil nuclear energy programme will be tied solely to imported uranium. Global uranium prices are already rising, in sympathy with hydrocarbons, and this could adversely affect the economics of nuclear power generation in India.

The Hyde Bill refers to "congruence" in certain aspects of foreign policy between the U.S. and India, and Iran's nuclear ambitions have been specifically mentioned. While the Prime Minister has repeatedly stated that India does not wish to see another nuclear weapon power in the region, India cannot give a carte blanche to the U.S. that it will associate itself with unspecified future actions Washington may take vis-à-vis Iran. Mr. Bush, when signing the Bill, has taken exception to certain provisions of the Hyde Bill and asserted the powers of the President to pursue the foreign policies of the U.S. Some U.S. Congressmen have criticised the President's assertions.

India should be prepared to deal with various expectations of the U.S. in future and learn to stand up for its own interests, even recognising the inherent asymmetry of the Indo-U.S. agreement. Contrary to the hopes of many who believe that Indo-U.S. relations will grow in all directions in an unimpeded manner, the reality may be one of working out mutual compromises in a patient and mature manner simply because the perceptions of the U.S. and India differ, given the geopolitical and historical contexts of the two countries.

Task for negotiators

To sum up then, the Indian negotiators of the 123 agreement must be instructed to raise all the issues that the Prime Minister referred to in the August 2006 intervention in the Rajya Sabha and other areas of concern in the Hyde Bill and obtain clear responses from the U.S. There should be no attempt to paper over differences or to accept suggestions that these could be addressed in due course of time. Once India accepts the agreement, it will find its freedom of action severely restricted and may well have to accommodate decisions not in its best interest. The negotiators must appreciate that the provisions of the agreement are of a long-term nature and indeed some clauses run "in perpetuity."

Finally, we must realise that an agreement that is in keeping with India's minimum expectations may not be reached. What are the consequences? India must pursue its national nuclear energy programme based on pressurised heavy water reactors, fast breeder reactors, and thorium utilisation with intensified vigour. All activities relating to locating new reserves of uranium, their mining and processing must be given the highest priority, and innovative solutions must be found to tackle local and environmental concerns. The Prototype Fast Breeder Reactor, the 700 MWe Pressurised Heavy Water Reactors, and the Advanced Heavy Water Reactor (using thorium) must be built and put into operation at the earliest. These actions and the general growth of the Indian economy will make the U.S. rethink the terms of the agreement and a revised one will no doubt emerge in due course of time. A delayed agreement is certainly better than a bad agreement, settled in haste.

(The writer is a member of the Atomic Energy Commission.)

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