October 31, 2016
New Delhi: Close to the next round of meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) in Vienna in November, India on Monday made another attempt to win over China that has been obstructing its membership application for the elite group.
October 31, 2016
New Delhi: Close to the next round of meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) in Vienna in November, India on Monday made another attempt to win over China that has been obstructing its membership application for the elite group.
Indian officials continued to engage with Beijing on the NSG issue ahead of the crucial meeting next week. Joint Secretray (Disarmament and International Security) Amandeep Singh Gill met China's Director General of Department of Arms Control Wang Qun in Beijing to convince about India's efforts in clean energy and need for NSG membership. This is the second meeting between the two sides in last two months.
The Chinese side has been holding on to a rigid position of signing of nuclear nonproliferation treaty (NPT) as a precondition for the NSG, while India seeks exemption on the basis of its 2008 waivers by the same group and its clean track record in nuclear sector.
Both sides said the talks were substantive and constructive but neither gave out any details about it.
"The talks were substantive and constructive. The engagement will continue as per the directive of the leadership," sources in the Indian Government said. The Chinese side too chose its words carefully. "The two sides exchanged views in a constructive and substantive manner on expansion of NSG, UNGA (United Nations General Assembly) first committee and eighth review conference of BWC (Biological Weapons Convention)," was all that the Chinese Government said..
Following the meeting between Gill and Qun on September 13 in New Delhi, China had issued a statement, saying it supports the notion of two-step approach within the NSG to explore a non-discriminatory formula applicable to all non-NPT States. The first stage is to explore and reach agreement on a non-discriminatory formula applicable to all the non-NPT states, and then take up country-specific membership issues at the second stage.
Without making any commitments, China had said in a statement in September, that the issue of the non-NPT states' participation in the NSG raises new questions for the Group under the new circumstances, and the whole focus was how to address the gap between the existing policies and practices of the non-NPT states and the existing international non-proliferation rules and norms based on the NPT as the cornerstone.
Courtesy: Pioneer
