GOV/MIL Nuclear Deal Could Spark Arms Race, Pakistan Warns

Pakistan has warned that a tentative deal allowing India to import nuclear fuel and technology could exacerbate nuclear tensions between the regional rivals, the Associated Press reported yesterday (see GSN, June 16).

In a letter dated last Friday and addressed to more than 60 nations, Pakistan warns that a pending arrangement for the International Atomic Energy Agency to conduct inspections of India’s civilian nuclear sites would harm counterproliferation efforts and could “increase the chances of a nuclear arms race in the subcontinent.”

Pakistan could vote against the safeguards agreement at an IAEA governing board meeting set for Aug. 1, AP reported.

The letter takes issue with the timing of the board meeting, which is scheduled to take place less than 45 days after the draft inspections deal was released to the board’s 35 member nations. Pakistan said the move “is likely to set a precedent for other states which are not members of the [Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty] and have military nuclear programs” (George Jahn, Associated Press/Washington Post, July 23).

Meanwhile, U.S. lawmakers are challenging a proposal by U.S. President George W. Bush to reallocate roughly $230 million in Pakistani counterterrorism aid to revamp the country’s F-16 fighter jets, the New York Times reported.

The funding would account for about two-thirds of the military assistance Pakistan is expected to receive from Washington this year. Pakistan usually avoids using the planes to attack suspected terrorist enclaves, however, because such attacks are likely to harm civilians.

The U.S. State Department, which notified U.S. lawmakers of the proposal last week, said the upgrades would boost the accuracy of the jets for counterterrorism missions (Eric Schmitt, New York Times, July 24). http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/24/world/asia/24pstan.html?_r=1&oref=slogin

Indian Diplomats Fan Out to Build Support for Nuclear Deal





Indian officials have begun an international push to end a decades-long prohibition on the nation purchasing nuclear technology from foreign suppliers, Agence France-Presse reported today (see GSN, July 23).

Envoys have departed New Delhi for Vienna, Berlin, Ireland and elsewhere to try to sustain new momentum created by this week’s parliamentary vote of confidence for Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. The vote hinged on lawmakers’ support for a tentative nuclear trade deal with the United States that would also create the conditions for other nations to provide nuclear technology.

The International Atomic Energy Agency’s governing board has scheduled an Aug. 1 special meeting to discuss the terms for the agency to monitor India’s civilian nuclear facilities. In exchange for access to foreign nuclear supplies, New Delhi has agreed to place its entire civilian nuclear sector under international supervision.

Should the IAEA board approve the inspections agreement, the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group would next consider whether to exempt India from long-standing trade rules that bar key nuclear sales to nations that have not signed the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and do not allow monitoring of all their nuclear programs.

The Indian envoys have been dispatched to IAEA headquarters in Vienna to key capitals of NSG states, AFP reported.

They are seeking quick action in the hopes that the U.S. deal, which must be approved by Congress, can be completed before U.S. presidential and congressional elections in November.

There is “a very short time to deal with the questions raised at the IAEA and NSG,” said former Indian diplomat Arundhati Ghosh. “The question is how strongly the countries supporting the deal will push for it. There will be spoilers” (Agence France-Presse I/Google News, July 24).

The Bush administration vowed to work for rapid approval in the international bodies.

“It’s getting down to the wire, that’s why we have a sense of urgency about it,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino said yesterday.

“We are going to try to work with these communities closely in the next few weeks,” she added. “There’s still some steps that have to take place before our Congress can even take a vote on it” (Agence France-Presse II/Economic Times, July 23).

what about Iran obviously its PC to support Hindu India but not Iran

Posted for fair use...
http://www.thenews.com.pk/print1.asp?id=126801

Pakistan's addiction
By Ali Eteraz
7/29/2008
There is a scene in the famous film about drug addiction, Requiem for a Dream, where the addict pushes his mother into the closet, then unlocks her TV which she had padlocked to the wall, and rolls it across many city blocks to a pawn shop. There, he sells it for 20 dollars and goes off to get high with his friend.

Then he passes out.

This scene came to mind recently when I was waiting for a flight at a US airport and watching a story about Pakistan on CNN. The story focused on how Pakistan's military command is trying to convince some extremely sceptical and recalcitrant members of the United States Congress to fork over a few F-16s that, the military says, are virtually essential to resisting the Taliban threat in Pakistan.

Here we have yet another case of an addict trying to fulfil its decadent addiction - in this case weapons - through any sort of manipulation and extortion it can think up. In fact, the truth is that the military's claims that F-16s are essential the war on terror is an outright lie. First of all, Pakistan's military doesn't very much directly engage with Taliban warlords. When military action does take place, it is usually the poor kids from the paramilitary (which means: not fully military) Frontier Corps that do the dying. F-16s don't enter the picture.

Second, Pakistan doesn't fight the Taliban militants the way the US in Afghanistan does. The Americans like to surround the militants with armoured vehicles, then hit them with airstrikes, then follow this up with a ground assault and helicopter gunships. Pakistan usually foregoes the use of airstrikes and gunships. F-16s don't enter the picture.

Third, dropping bombs from up high on the Taliban would be a self-defeating exercise because it would further increase the impression that Pakistan's war on warlords is a job outsourced from Washington DC, when in fact it must be something the Pakistanis want. F-16s shouldn't enter the picture.

In other words, F-16s have nothing to do with the most pressing national security issue afflicting the Pakistani nation, yet here I am, thousands of miles from Pakistan, listening to the pre-eminent news station in the world, and the lead story about Pakistan isn't the oil-food-currency crisis in the country or the economic development in NWFP or the issue of Pashtun nationalism, it is a squadron of airplanes.

What for?

According to Pakistani military expert, Shuja Nawaz, and various other international groups, Pakistan has a larger standing army than the United States of America. Pakistan spends nearly as much more on its military than on its education as does the United States of America. Pakistan has more high ranking military officials, including at least two hundred more generals, than the United States of America. Pakistan sends more officers and troops to the UN Peacekeeping mission than 99 per cent of the rest of the world. Yet listening to this news story one gets the impression that such a heavily militarized country cannot defeat a few Taliban warlords unless and until it gets those ten or twelve F-16s.

Something is very wrong with such a picture. All signs point to addiction; one in which the military has successfully co-opted Pakistan's civilian structure as well.

No doubt Prime Minister Gilani, on his way to Washington DC now, is coming to politely shout at the US congresswoman holding up the deal for the F-16s. To accomplish this, he will endeavour to make American policy experts believe that the fate of the entire future of the world rests on the procurement of these aged aircrafts. As he does this, the US media will pick up on the story and tell everyone that Pakistan is run by such a bunch of inept loons that what separates a functioning republic from a nuclear caliphate is merely one squadron of aged planes. The worldwide community will then proceed to simultaneously bite their nails and laugh at Pakistan, all of which will make Pakistanis even more ashamed of their nation than they already are. This is the sort of self-hatred that addiction arouses.

People like to say that Pakistan's addiction - to weaponry and military hardware and brass medals and tin skinned rulers - is due to its confrontation with India, with which the nation is waging a purported cold war, for which it needs to match its counterpart blow for blow, as did the US and the USSR.

Yet, illusion is all this is.

A cold war implies a bit of parity. Between India and Pakistan nothing like this exists. Economically, financially, monetarily, militarily and most importantly, in terms of self-worth, India outstrips Pakistan by a significant margin. If there was a cold war once, its long been won by the Indians. Pakistan is the USSR in the 1980's. Getting a few F-16s will do nothing to restore the balance of power. All you have today are military commanders, relics from an earlier time, trying to feed their addiction (and their friends' defence contracts) by simultaneously begging and screaming to the US Congress.

Then, when these tricks don't work, all of a sudden there is an upsurge of attacks by the Taliban warlords, and Peshawar looks like its going to fall. This frightens the US and it goes rushing into the closet and hands to the Pakistani leaders the keys to its padlocked possessions.

At this point, Pakistani leaders get high.

Then they pass out.

(Usually in Europe or Dubai).

How long can this addiction go on? NWFP is being sacrificed to it as we speak. That leaves only three provinces after that.



The writer is a political commentator. Email: eteraz@gmail.com