U.S. ‘has cut Indian N-link’

Press, 20 April 1981, Page 6

U.S. ‘has cut Indian N-link’

NZPA Madras ,J The United States has told . India that it has decided unilaterally to end its nuclear co-operation agreement with India, the “Hindu” newspaper has reported in a dispatch from its correspond-' ent in Washington. The Tarapur atomic power station on the western coast of India was built by the United States under the treaty, which provides for American supply of enriched uranium up to 1993 to fuel the plant. The decision, conveyed by James Malone, an aide of President Ronald Reagan, to the Indian External Affairs Secretary (Mr Eric Gon- . salves) and the Indian |- Atomic Energy Commission - chairman (Mr H. N. Sethna), who are visiting Washington, ; came after India's steadfast refusal to open all its nu- • : clear installations to inter- |: national inspection. | < Though the Tarapur plant sitself is under safeguards, the i; 1978 United States Nuclear - < Nonproliferation Act made Ji inspections of all atomic ' 1 facilities (India has five) a ’ 1 prerequisite for future fuel. t shipments. £ 3 The independent news- t paper said that Mr Malone ’ t had told the Indian officials < that, despite its unilateral \ repudiation of the bilateral t accord, Washington would v still have control over the t spent fuel, which can be r

S * ■ reprocessed into '«• weapongrade '. plutonium.’ (Another report at the week-end asid that India was about to start reprocessing spent., fuel to recover plutonium after tests '! at Tarapur.) :? . ■ j The “Hindu” said that Mr Sethna, India’s top nuclear official,-deplored the American repudiation of the treaty arid _ “rejected out the hand the idea of maintaining safeguards” over : nuclear materials., • ■ ■ ” j It quoted a senior Indian diplomat in Washington as saying that the American decision was “like asking for a divorce and demanding that the other party not marry anybody else.” . ■ In two, days of meetings with Mr Haig and other top American officials Mr Gonsalves and Mr Sethna’were told that the United States plhns to develop a military relationship with Pakistan despite India’s protests. i However, also discussed, according to the American official, was “a potential . military relationship” between the United States and India, especially India’s,’interest in buying anti-tank missiles and howitzers. • j’ American officials said they did not believe- that developing military alliances -. with both India and Pakistan,bitter enemies of each other,! would increase tensions in the area or lead to an arms race on the subcontinent. I