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M. Jamil (Pakistan Observer)
Nuclear collaboration between China and Pakistan dates back to 1986, when both countries signed a Comprehensive Nuclear Cooperation Agreement on 15th September in Beijing. The salient clauses of the agreement included that China would construct four nuclear plants in Pakistan namely Chashma 1, 2, 3 and 4 by 2011. This agreement does not fall within the ambit of IAEA or Nuclear Suppliers Group, as China had signed the Protocol Additional to the IAEA Safeguards Agreement in 1998 and in March 2002 it formally completed the domestic legal procedures necessary for the Additional Protocol to enter into force to become member of Non-Proliferation Treaty. Since China had signed nuclear agreement with Pakistan in 1986, China is not under obligation to abide by the conditions laid down in NSG. Speaking on the sidelines of silver jubilee celebrations of the Fast Breeder Test Reactor (FBTR) and Radio Metallurgy Laboratory (RML), the Indian Minister of State for Science and Technology, Prithviraj Chavan said the other day that India had serious concerns about transfer of nuclear technology illegally to Pakistan.
After the news of Pak-China deal for supplying two more nuclear reactors, America had hinted that it would take up the matter in Nuclear Suppliers Group, but it did not dare do it because China could have opted out of the NSG. America’s double standards are obvious from its nuclear deal with India. After signing nuclear deal with India, the US had refused to ink similar deal with energy starved Pakistan. On October 1, 2008, the US Congress had given final approval to an agreement facilitating nuclear cooperation between America and India. The deal was first introduced in a joint statement release by the then President George W Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in 2005. The NSG had approved the agreement between the US and India on September 6, 2008. There is a perception that Indo-US Nuclear Deal has set the precedence and opened the door for any such deal in the future. In fact it has obscured the prospects of stopping Iran and North Korea from pursuing nuclear ambitions. If India, the primary proliferator could be given such a concession by the NSG, why Pakistan be deprived from it?In June 2010, during Indo-US strategic dialogue, India told the US that it had serious objections to the proposed China-Pakistan nuclear deal. The US also expressed its concern about the deal after the additional UN sanctions were slapped on Iran with the cooperation of China, Russia and France. Before the plenary session of Nuclear Suppliers Group, the US state department spokesperson Gordon Duguid had said: “The US has reiterated to China that the US expects Beijing to cooperate with Pakistan in ways consistent with Chinese nonproliferation obligations”. India had expected that the said deal would be discussed at New Zealand in 46-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) meeting, which monitored such transactions. But that did not happen because all the decisions in NSG are made with consensus, and if one of the suppliers opposed or insisted on its stance, no agreement can be reached. In a statement issued at the end of its two-day plenary meeting in Christchurch, New Zealand, the NSG had only stated that its members “agreed to continue considering ways to further strengthen guidelines dealing with the transfer of ENR technologies”. International media however continues ranting that Pak-China agreement will be a violation of international guidelines forbidding nuclear exports to countries that have not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) or do not have international safeguards on reactors. It has to be mentioned that India is not a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty, yet it has been given exemption by the NSG on the recommendation and persuasion of the US, France and Russia despite the fact the NSG is not supposed to supply nuclear-related materials to the country that has not signed the NPT. Anyhow, China took the plea that agreement was inked before it joined the NSG in 2004, which, according to analysts, would exclude the Pak-China deal from the purview of any obligations to the NSG.
As clarified by Qin Gang, the spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry that “the nuclear cooperation between the two countries was for peaceful purposes and totally consistent with its international obligations and safeguards of the International Atomic Energy Agency”. Under the deal, China will export two nuclear power reactors to Pakistan at the cost of $2.375-billion. As regards Pak-China Nuclear Deal it is too well known that it was concluded in 1986 when China had neither signed the NPT nor become member of the NSG neither the member of Nuclear Suppliers Group.
It is common knowledge that India remained outside the international nuclear mainstream since it misused Canadian and US peaceful nuclear assistance to conduct its 1974 nuclear bomb test; refused to sign the nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty, and conducted additional nuclear tests in 1998. Though India had been cut off from most US civilian nuclear assistance since 1978 and most international assistance since 1992 because of violation in 1974, yet it claims that India has excellent record as compared with Pakistan. Anyhow, India’s willingness to open some nuclear reactors for international inspection in return for the deal was not enough, as the agreement allowed it to keep its 8 nuclear reactors off-limits. It appears that hypocrisy, strategic interest and greed of the US and the West for approximately a couple of hundred billion dollars had been victorious, and international covenants and laws were trampled when the US Congress put its stamp of approval on the controversial Indo-US nuclear deal, and then the Senate had overwhelmingly voted a Bill paving the way for the implementation of civil nuclear deal between the two countries.
But despite Pakistan’s joining defence pacts with the West, China valued Pakistan’s sentiments vis-à-vis snapping relations with Taiwan. On its part, China has helped Pakistan in variety of projects including Gwadar Port Project and Saindak Copper Project in Balochistan. Earlier, Machine Tool Factory of Karachi and Heavy Mechanical Complex at Taxila were also established with China’s help. China has extended full cooperation to make Pakistan self-reliant by providing know-how with a view to strengthening and ensuring territorial integrity and sovereignty of Pakistan. At the present Beijing and Islamabad are involved in joint production of JF-17 Thunder aircraft, which has the most sophisticated avionics. Above all, China considers stability of Pakistan as cornerstone of its foreign policy. Pakistan should never forget that.
The writer is Lahore-based senior journalist.
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