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Burns: U.S. will help India create a multilateral reserve of fuel

Washington: United States Under Secretary of State Nicholas Burns said here on Friday he was reluctant to discuss if he visualised any problems regarding the India-U.S. nuclear deal.

Asked by journalists whether India would have the right to explode a nuclear device, Mr. Burns said New Delhi would have the “sovereign right,” but he hoped that such a situation would not arise.

“It is hard to deal in hypotheticals because they are very far from the reality of the situations. The reality is that India is not in a situation where it is currently testing.” But if there is a nuclear test, then American law says the U.S. President would have to decide whether or not to ask for fuel and technology back, Mr. Burns said.

“We have preserved that legal right in our law. But it is a choice; it is not automatic,” said Mr. Burns, who was the main U.S. negotiator of the agreement.

Asked if the Right of Return is exercised what is it that America could ask for, he said: “It is very hard to say without knowing the specifics of what happened, why it happened and how. But the legal right to do something has been protected.”

Mr. Burns explained that four specific fuel assurances that President George W. Bush made to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on March 2, 2006 had been written verbatim in the Hyde Act.

These were “assurances from our Government to the Government of India that we will, as its partner, help it to provide for a continuous supply of nuclear fuel to its power reactors,” he said.

One of the assurances is that the U.S. will help India create a multilateral reserve of fuel. “We suggest that India can work with the IAEA. This makes sense for, any country would want to have a continuous supply of fuel to power reactors.”

But this did not obviate the fact that both countries have laws that they lived up to. “One of our laws is the Atomic Energy Act and we have preserved the ability of any future President to fulfil his or her legal obligation under it,” Mr. Burns added.

He hoped that the India-IAEA safeguards agreement and “action” of the NSG could be accomplished by this autumn and the deal would come up for voting in Congress by December. — PTI

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Burns: U.S. will help India create a multilateral reserve of fuel

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