Nuclear deal set to boost US-India ties

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On Saturday Condoleezza Rice, US Secretary of State, and her Indian hosts celebrated a deepening strategic partnership, even though lat-minute hitches derailed the signing in New Delhi of a landmark civil nuclear agreement.

The deal will be signed soon as promised by both sides, as soon as bureaucratic hurdles are cleared, but said that this event highlighted a dramatically transformed relationship and what Rice calls a recognition of India's emergence on the global stage.

Rice's Indian counterpart Pranab Mukherjee said that his country looks to the United States as its largest trading partner and the largest source of investment.

Mukherjee said that ties will grow further because the deal allows India to build more nuclear reactors to satisfy its surging demand for energy at a time of rising oil prices and global warming fears.

India's external affairs minister said that India's quest to build a knowledge society leads them to work very closely with the USA, whether it is energy, anti-terrorist steps, trade or high technology.

On Saturday night Mukherjee, with Rice sitting next to him, said that the deal has opened the door for India for international nuclear commerce.

President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh first agreed to the deal back in 2005 as part of a strategic partnership between the two biggest democracies but the two countries spent three years negotiating the deal.

The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), the UN nuclear watchdog, and the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG), which controls global atomic trade, had to give the ok for the deal to be final and Rice and others had to lobby hard to win that approval.

Rice also pushed hard for the agreement to be approved by both houses of congress. The agreement- which lifts a ban on civilian nuclear trade imposed after India first conducted a nuclear test explosion in 1974.

Lawmakers had sought safeguards on preventing the spread of nuclear weapons technology before passing it overwhelmingly last week and handing Bush administration a foreign policy success.

According to critics this deal undermines global efforts to curb the spread of nuclear weapons because India has refused to sign the international non-proliferation treaty (NPT).

India will have access to sophisticated US technology and cheap atomic energy in return for New Delhi allowing UN inspections of some of its civilian nuclear facilities. However military nuclear sites will not be inspected.

Meanwhile back at home, Prime Minister Singh has had a rough ride because the main opposition Hindu nationalists and the Communists have both slammed the deal as curbing India's military options and bringing the country's foreign policy too much under US influence.

Rice said that Washington expected a fair shake for its businesses in return for its hard work. Rice also said that she thinks that the Indians will recognise that the USA took the strategic step and helped India get through the NSG and the IAEA and so forth. She went on and said that ultimately what American companies are really asking is for an opportunity to demonstrated what they can do.

As for the nuclear deal, even after it has been signed, US firms that build reactors and provide nuclear know-how cannot do business until New Delhi signs a safeguards agreement with the IAEA.

Last week John Rood, a senior State Department official who worked on the nuclear deal, was interviewed by reporters and he ignored suggestions that the US partnership with India is designed as a counterpoint to China's rising power.