India’s application for Nuclear Suppliers’ Group (NSG) membership was taken up at the 48-nation bloc’s special session in Seoul on Thursday night. Although no consensus was reached in the meeting, several countries, including Brazil, Austria, New Zealand, Ireland and Turkey, opposed India’s induction into the NSG, citing India’s non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) status as the reason.
No discussion on Pakistan’s membership of the NSG took place even though Pakistani President Mamnoon Hussain thanked Chinese President Xi Jinping for China’s support for its NSG bid. He said:
Only granting India the membership of the NSG will shift the balance of power (in the region).
Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Narendra Modi met Chinese President Xi in Tashkent on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation event, and urged him to consider India’s bid on its “merit”.
Non-Proliferation Treaty
Although admission of members like India which are not signatories to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) is not on the agenda, Japan and some other countries are understood to have raised the matter in the opening session.
Thereafter, it was agreed to consider a number of unscheduled items including India’s application at a special session after dinner, informed sources said. It was not immediately clear that whether the discussion on India’s membership, which is strongly opposed by China, and few other countries will come up informally or in a formal way.
Indian diplomats, led by Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar, are there to lobby, although they are not participants at the plenary in the absence of India’s membership.
The Indian team includes Amandeep Gill, head of ‘Disarmament and International Security’ division in the External Affairs Ministry.
While the US and France have issued statements ahead of the plenary strongly supporting India’s case and asking members to back New Delhi, China has been unrelenting in its opposition harping on the need to have a criteria for non-NPT countries like India and clubbing India’s case with that of Pakistan for which it is batting.
Roughly 20 countries are backing India’s case fully but given that the decisions in NSG are taken by consensus, India faces an uphill task.
(With agency inputs.)
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