New Delhi: India has decided to enhance transparency of its nuclear infrastructure by ratifying an Additional Protocol with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) — a step that in a single stroke can be leveraged to boost energy security and lift international confidence. India will now also inform the watchdog about its nuclear exports.
Before coming to power, BJP had expressed its unease over the deal. The government has, however, ratified the Additional Protocol – a commitment given under Indo-US nuclear deal by the previous dispensation to grant greater access to the nuclear watchdog. This will facilitate India’s entry as a full member of the 45-member Nuclear Suppliers Group which meets this week.
India has already placed several nuclear facilities under IAEA’s watch. This includes a part of the nuclear fuel complex in Hyderabad, the nuclear reactor in Rajasthan, the older reactors at Tarapur, and India’s largest nuclear reactors at Kudankulam in Tamil Nadu.
IAEA had in March 2009 approved an Additional Protocol to India’s safeguards agreement after a pact to place Indian civilian nuclear facilities under IAEA safeguards. The protocol allowed the Nuclear Suppliers Group to grant a waiver for India to have commercial relations with other countries in the civilian atomic field.
The waiver was necessary as India, despite being a nuclear-armed state, is not a signatory to the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.
Sources say India wants to send a strong signal to the international community that it is a “serious and responsible” nuclear weapon state amid its keenness to become a member of the Nuclear Suppliers Group or NSG.
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(With PTI inputs)