Govt.’s new push for N-deal – open confrontation with Left,India and the World, News Analysis, India News Online

The India-US civil nuclear deal is triggering a fresh confrontation between the Congress and the Left and is strengthening speculation about an early Lok Sabha poll. Buoyed by an estimate that it can ride on the goodwill generated by the populist Budget for 2008-09 and win elections if held before the due date, the UPA Government appears to be ready to push the deal again. The confrontation between the UPA and the Left on the deal entered the most crucial phase last week with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh telling Parliament that the Government was determined to go ahead with the deal and External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee in a separate statement also signalled the Government’s seriousness in sealing the agreement and seeking “broad political consensus” within the country.

Notwithstanding the subsequent March 8 statement by Mukherjee that the UPA will not sacrifice the Government for the nuclear deal, his earlier statement in Parliament on March 3 that it has not given up the deal and will continue to strive for a political consensus, makes it clear that the Government is keen to take advantage of the budget concessions to farmers and the middle class in the form of loan waivers and tax rebates to go in for early elections. The visit of the US Assistant Secretary of State, Richard Boucher, to New Delhi to push for the nuclear deal and Mukherjee’s planned visit to the US in the coming days are also clearer indications that if pushed to the wall, the UPA Government will go ahead with the signing of the agreement and if the Left withdraws its support, it will dissolve Parliament and seek early elections. It would thus go to the polls with a big election advantage and cast the Left as anti-national. The Left parties are already red with rage and have sought an early meeting of the Left-UPA Joint Committee to hear from the Government what it has in mind. It has given the March 15 deadline for calling the meeting. An Indian team has just returned from Vienna after the latest round of talks with IAEA officials and its outcome is likely to be shared with the Left parties at the meeting. An open confrontation with the Left parties is feared as the Left will be going to the meeting armed with an ultimatum to pull the rug from under the feet of the Government if it takes the next step to operationalise the deal behind the back of the Communist parties.

Mukherjee’s statements

Pranab Mukherjee made two statements within days which, if closely analyzed, indicated that although it is not keen to burn all the bridges with the Left, the Government will not give up the civilian nuclear deal with the US and will continue to build a “political consensus” to sign and operationalize the agreement. A Department of Atomic Energy team returned from Vienna on March 2 with what appears to be the final draft of the agreement.

Mukherjee, in a statement in Parliament on March 3 said that the Government was actively engaged in consultations with the IAEA and will continue to seek a broad political consensus within the country. But, he stepped back after a sharp reaction by the Left to his statement and sought to calm down the Communist parties by saying that the Government would not sacrifice the office for the deal. In an interview with NDTV on March 8, he was asked if he foresaw early elections. He replied: “Nobody is talking of holding elections now…there is no talk of sacrificing the Government for something. We want the polls in due time. I do not visualize anything of an early election.” He added that the UPA coalition partners were also not in favour of early elections. When asked if the confrontation over the deal could lead to the collapse of the partnership with the Left, Mukherjee maintained that the Government has no option but to carry along with the Left by continuing to resolve its concerns over the deal which, he noted, will not take place if the Left pulls the plug from the Congress-led UPA regime to reduce it to a minority Government.

Reacting to warnings by CPI[M] and CPI leaders Prakash Karat and A.B. Bardhan that the Government must be ready to face the withdrawal of support if it proceeded with the deal, Mukherjee sought to downplay any sense of crisis by saying that the Left was only articulating its “known positions”.

Amid pressure on New Delhi from Washington, with US senior officials and Senators setting a May deadline for the deal to be pushed to the US Congress to become a reality, Mukherjee said India had conveyed to America that it could not work “within a specific timeframe” to clinch the deal.

Mukherjee’s statement came a day after Bardhan and Prakash Karat shot off separate letters to the Prime Minister and the External Affairs Minister respectively, making the Left’s withdrawal threat official for the first time and the Leftists setting the March 15 deadline to call a Left-UPA Committee meeting on the nuclear deal to discuss the latest Government position.

The External Affairs Minister’s statement that the Government would do nothing which would jeopardize its fate before elections came just days after the Prime Minister and Mukherjee himself, while speaking in Parliament, renewed their bid to seek a “political consensus” on the deal. Pitching the IAEA negotiations for an India-specific safeguards agreement as the one that will “open the doors to civil nuclear cooperation with various countries including Russia, US, France and UK”, Mukherjee signalled the Government’s seriousness in sealing the nuclear deal. For this he said the Government will continue to seek a broad political consensus within the country to take forward engagement on this issue with other countries. Making a suo motu statement in the Lok Sabha, he said the conclusion of such an agreement with the IAEA will enable the NSG to amend its guidelines for civil nuclear commerce in favour of India. He referred to criticism about the applicability of the Hyde Act to the Indo-US nuclear deal and reiterated that it is an enabling provision that is between the executive and legislative organs of the US Government. He claimed that India’s rights and obligations regarding civil nuclear cooperation with the US arise only from the bilateral 123 Agreement that has been agreed upon with America.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh also made a last ditch effort at forming a political consensus when he appealed to his predecessor, Atal Bihari Vajpayee, “to listen to the call of his conscience and back the deal by rising above party politics.” Replying to its discussion on the motion of thanks on the President’s Address on March 5, he described Vajpayee as the “Bhishma Pitamah” (the grand patriarch) of Indian politics and asked the BJP to have a rethink on its opposition to the nuclear deal.

The statements of Dr. Singh and Mukherjee came in the wake of a lot of chatter that the Indo-US nuclear deal is as good as dead that is because there is no sign of the consensus that the Government is seeking on the issue. The BJP seeks the nuclear deal as a political issue to confront the UPA Government and nothing else. The Left is blinded by a dead ideology and seeks a red herring in improved relations with the US out of fear of “imperialism”.

The Left parties hit back after the statement of Mukherjee in Parliament. Upping the ante, the CPM led Left issued an ominous warning that the Government’s future will depend on the decision it will take on Washington’s pressure to conclude the deal. Ratcheting up pressure on the Government to make it clear by March 15 its real intentions on the issue, the Left set the stage for what could be a decisive showdown in the coming days. Prakash Karat wrote a letter to Pranab Mukherjee asking him to convene a UPA-Left Joint Committee meeting on the nuclear deal by March 15 to ascertain what the Government wants to do about the nuclear deal. Sources say Karat called up leaders of other Left parties, CPI, RSP and Forward Bloc, on March 6 and consulted them on the issue before shooting off the letter. Sources say during these consultations, Left leaders also advised Karat to thrash out the issue with the Government once and for all. CPI leader Raja, a member of the committee, met Karat for a brainstorming session on the nuclear deal. The Left parties have taken note of the latest deadline the Americans have set for India in the context of the nuclear deal and are toying with the idea of setting their own deadline for the UPA Government to keep their political catchment areas intact.

The letter cited media reports that negotiations with the IAEA on a draft safeguards agreement have covered considerable ground. The agreement between the UPA Government and the Left parties is that without initialling the draft IAEA safeguards agreement, the Government would come back to the committee, which would take a decision on it. Thus the draft agreement would fall within the purview of the UPA-Left Joint Committee, which has not met since November, 2007. The leaders of the Left parties interpreted the ministerial assertions on the issue in Parliament as an indication of the regime’s plans to finalise the text worked out with the IAEA. Although the Prime Minister refused to divulge details about the negotiations with the IAEA, there are indications to suggest that the text of the agreement is ready.

The letter also took cognizance of Mukherjee’s statement in Parliament which indicated that the Government had not given up on the 123 agreement and also that the Government’s understanding of the controversial Hyde Act was different from the Left’s view of it.

In a separate statement, the CPI(M) found fault in Mukherjee’s assertion that the Hyde Act was an enabling provision between the executive and legislative organs of the Government and India’s rights and obligations regarding civil nuclear cooperation with the US arise only from the 123 Agreement. The CPM said none other than the Secretary of State Ms. Condoleezza Rice, had told the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Feb. 14 that “we will support nothing with India in the NSG that is in contradiction to the Hyde Act. It will have to be completely consistent with the obligations of the Hyde Act.”

Sitaram Yechury also said his party the (CPM) does not agree with the Government that the Hyde Act’s implications do not exist for India. The BJP also joined the anti-Hyde Act chorus and the party leader V.K. Malhotra said it is strange that India and the US have different interpretations of it.

Yechury told the Government that it should take the next step on the Indo-US nuclear deal only on the basis of the UPA-Left Committee’s finding and should drop it if it is not approved by the panel. He said (March 8), that even some of the UPA planners felt the Left concerns are genuine which should be addressed first. Whether our concerns would be addressed would be known at a UPA-Left Committee meeting to be convened soon after the return of the Indian team from the IAEA, he added. Yechury made it clear that the Leftist concern would be resolved only if the Hyde Act does not apply to the Indo-US nuclear deal. “We think, the 123 Agreement is anchored in the Hyde Act and its conditionalities.” He said, the Left parties do not agree with the Government that the deal was in national interest. Asked about CPI leader Bardhan’s statement to withdraw support if the Government went ahead with the deal, he said: “Our agenda is the nuclear deal and not the stability of the Government or an early or late election that is for the Government to decide.”

Attacking Mukherjee’s statement on seeking a political consensus, the CPM statement said the Government should first respect the majority opinion expressed by Parliament when the agreement was discussed and acknowledge that its stand on the nuclear deal does not have a political consensus and hence, it should not proceed further.

Political observers say Karat’s demand for immediate convening of the UPA-Left panel may be indicative of the CPM’s intention to ensure prompt death and burial of the nuclear deal – arguably the most important foreign policy achievement of the UPA Government. The two sides may go far beyond mere sabre-rattling and may decide to part ways instead of keeping up the unity façade. The clearest indication of the Left parties’ imminent divorce with the Government came recently as yesterday from veteran CPM leader Jyoti Basu who said in Kolkata: “They (the Government) are dependent on us, we are dependent on them, to keep the BJP away. I do not know how long this arrangement would continue.”

Undeterred by the Left Front’s ultimatum to clarify its position on the nuclear deal, the Congress Party talked tough and said in no unclear terms that the deal would happen. After Dr. Manmohan Singh and Pranab Mukherjee underlined the Government’s resolve to see the deal through, Congress Party Media Department Chairman Veerappa Moily said: “The deal will happen in the interest of the nation.” Dropping the party’s earlier defensive stand the Congress even went as far as warning that they will have a lot of explaining to do if they pull down the UPA Government on an issue of “national pride”. As for the Left’s renewed threat to pull down the Government, he asked, “Is it their mandate to shoot down national pride?”

Boucher visit : Hyde Act to apply

Ironically, barely 24 hours after Mukherjee claimed in Parliament that the Hyde Act was not binding on India, the visiting US Assistant Secretary of State, Richard Boucher provided more ammunition to the Left’s attack on the UPA Government by insisting that the Hyde Act will have to be taken in to account while operationalising the agreement. Boucher who came to New Delhi for talks on expediting the agreement in view of the very short time left for the Bush Administration because of the coming Presidential election, told reporters on arrival that the Hyde Act is a domestic legislation and the 123 Agreement is an international agreement. “I think we can move forward with both in a consistent manner”. Boucher’s comments on the Hyde Act are consistent with statements made by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. She had said that the NSG exemption would have to be consistent with the obligations mentioned in the Hyde Act and had said that the US would not support a waiver that was contrary to the Hyde Act provisions.

Boucher who came to New Delhi on March 5 to get an update on the ongoing developments with the nuclear deal, discussed the issue with Foreign Secretary Shiv Shankar Menon in addition to holding discussions with his counterpart in External Affairs Ministry Joint Secretary Gayatri Kumar. He once again reminded Foreign Office officials that the clock was ticking, emphasizing the need for India to wrap up the safeguards pact with the IAEA so that the deal may be ratified by the US Congress before July.

Talking to newsmen after the round of meetings in South Block, he gave a May deadline for obtaining an exemption from the NSG so that the 123 Agreement could reach the US by June. Even as Prime Minister Singh promised to seek a broad consensus before getting into the remaining steps, Boucher warned that the two countries were already running against time to conclude the deal but added that it can still be pushed through. He also upheld the political time-limit given by Senator Joseph Biden during his visit to India. With the July timeframe in mind , Boucher said that the NSG step has to be concluded by May and that the 123 Agreement needs to reach the US Congress by June, in time for a debate and an up or down vote by July.

With the US Presidential elections already dominating politics in the Washington, the Bush Administration wants to push through the deal as quickly as possible before it loses its clout within Congress and loses the bipartisan support it claims it still has within Congress. Boucher also said that he had not yet seen the final draft of the India-specific IAEA safeguards agreement and said that the US needs at least a month or two to push for a consensus within the NSG where countries which are not used to working outside of the Non-Proliferation Treaty had a lot of queries, “We need a month or two at least to work with the NSG countries. People are committed to non proliferation. There are going to be questions and we have good answers,” he said and added that India’s case was unique and would require more effort to gain a consensus in the NSG.

New Delhi has not taken a serious view of the deadline set out by Boucher. The deadline for “concluding the deal – freezing a text with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA): getting Nuclear Suppliers’ Group (NSG) clearance; and then sending the 123 Agreement draft to the US Congress – has moved from November –December 2007 to February 2008 to now, the late summer of 2008. When a US Senate delegation arrived New Delhi in February, it indicated that “May-June” was the new outside limit for the deal. The Indian assessment is that the deadline can be “stretched as far as August”. “We would like to do it by the summer,” an Indian official said, “but if the American calculation is that this deal is necessary for 21st century grand strategy, then deadlines are meaningless.”

American critics demand explanation on key issues

As efforts continue for a speedy conclusion of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal four leading American critics have demanded that the Bush Administration “come clean” by making public its responses to a set of 40-odd congressional questions on the subject. Asserting that the law makers’ questions have been aimed at sorting out “ambitious and contradictory statements” about the deal, they called upon the State Department to drop its “virtual gag order” and make the responses public. “The Administration’s responses should be made publicly available so that US and India lawmakers and the public may evaluate whether the draft US-India accord conforms to the terms and conditions established by (US) Congress,” they said. The critics, all members of Washington’s powerful non-proliferation lobby that has been waging a relentless campaign to scuttle the deal, commented that the Administration’s unwillingness to make their answers more widely available suggests they have something to hide from either US or Indian legislators. The House Committee on Foreign Affairs had sent the questions to the State Department last October, said the critics, who include Arms Control Association Executive Director Daryl G. Kimball, former non-proliferation officials Fred McGoldrick and Henry Sokolski and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s senior associate Sharon Squassoni The State Department has said that the deal complies fully with US law and that the administration has provided extensive briefings to Congress. But the critics maintained that since the answers are not classified, the department should be willing to share them with all members of Congress and with the public. According to a statement put out by Kimball and others some of the key questions asked by the House panel are:

Will the Government terminate nuclear trade with India if it resumes testing? Whether the US intends to transfer sensitive nuclear technology through the agreement or outside the agreement that can be used to make nuclear weapons material? Will the new safeguards agreement between India and the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) apply on perpetuity as called for in law, or be subject to unspecified “corrective actions” as India demands? Will the Government be legally required to help India secure nuclear fuel supplies from other states even if nuclear cooperation is suspended? “Clear responses about the proposed US-Indian nuclear trade deal are needed now, not later, because decisions may soon be taken by other nuclear supplier states that could undermine US non-proliferation law and policy,” Kimball said.

Forward movement at IAEA – draft pact frozen

India’s efforts to firm up a safeguards agreement with the IAEA have meanwhile, moved a decisive step forward with the agency for the first time giving a firm statement that both sides were “close to a final text”, indicating that only a few minor issues now remained before the draft agreement is ready for further consideration. It is learnt that talks are continuing even after the Indian negotiating team returned after the fifth round of productive discussions last week. “We are close to a final text,” an IAEA spokesperson said about the status of these discussions.

As a scheduled meeting of the IAEA Board of Governors is currently in session, sources said, India’s Permanent Representative to the IAEA Saurabh Kumar is holding consultations with agency officials and other key countries on the margins. Based on the feedback he is receiving from New Delhi, there is a concerted effort underway to firm up the draft agreement. Clearly, India and IAEA have remained in close touch after the DAE-led negotiating team returned with a draft that was almost ready with only some areas of divergence on representing issues like the right to take corrective action in the text of the agreement.

Sources said there has been movement with both sides showing flexibility in a bid to end the negotiation at the earliest. “Several options” have been agreed upon with the IAEA as far as the supply of nuclear fuel to India, or New Delhi’s right to take corrective measures is concerned. After this, the understanding between India and the IAEA appears to be that the “options” that New Delhi prefers could be closed without another round of talks. In that sense, the text appears to have been frozen, but a political call in New Delhi on the nuances is being seen as a must.

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