India and Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) membership

Abstract

The Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) was founded in 1974 in response to the Indian nuclear test in order to prevent nuclear proliferation by controlling nuclear exports. In 2008, the NSG exempted India from its full-scope safeguards (FSS) condition, making it the first country to be allowed to have nuclear trade with NSG members while retaining its nuclear weapons program. India won this waiver after tough negotiations and having resisted tough nonproliferation conditions. India is now bidding for NSG membership. This paper analyses the prospects for the membership in light of the waiver negotiations and how the waiver negotiations can guide us in assessing the likely path of the membership negotiations. This study concludes that India will resist any conditions and the US and India have to invest massive diplomatic efforts to reach a formula that addresses the nonproliferation concerns of member states.

Keywords:

• international relations
• identity
• strategy
• regionalism

Notes on contributor

Saira Bano is a PhD candidate in the Centre for Military and Strategic Studies (CMSS) at the University of Calgary, Canada. Her research focuses on the nuclear nonproliferation regime, nuclear weapons issues in South Asia, especially India, and nonproliferation policies of states such the US, Pakistan, Israel, and India. She has won several academic and research awards. She was awarded the prestigious Joseph-Armand Bombardier Canada Graduate Scholarship Doctoral by SSHRC (Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council) and Graduate Research Award by the Simons Foundation.

Notes

1 United States, United Kingdom, Soviet Union, Canada, Germany, and Japan.

2 Text of the NFCIRC/254 available at http://www.iaea.org/Publications/Documents/Infcircs/Others/infcirc254.shtml.

3 The similarity in the tasks of the Zangger Committee and the NSG led to the question of maintaining two separate groups. Some suggested discontinuing one or amalgamating them both into one group. Others suggested maintaining the existing order in which the Zangger Committee stays strictly within the legal framework of the NPT, while the NSG has broadened its mandate beyond the limits of the NPT to include physical protection and dual-use technology control. Please see Fritz W. Schmidt, ‘NPT export Controls and the Zangger Committee’, Nonproliferation Review 7, no. 3 (2000): 138; Daniel Joyner, International Law and the Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009); Tariq Rauf, ‘Export Controls and Multilateral Nuclear Arrangements’, in Nuclear Proliferation and International Security, ed. Morton Bremer Mærli and Sverre Lodgaard, Routledge Global Security Studies (Abingdon, Oxon: Routledge, 2007), 296.

4 To counter these repeated claims, the United States sponsored three seminars, in 1997, 1999, and 2009, to explain the activities of the Group. These seminars were also in response to the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference that called for transparency in the nuclear export controls. In 2001 it was decided to create an official NSG website to bring further transparency. See INFCIRC/539/Rev.4, http://www.nuclearsuppliersgroup.org/Leng/05-pubblic.htm.

5 ‘The NSG Guidelines’, Nuclear Suppliers Group, http://www.nuclearsuppliersgroup.org/Leng/05-pubblic.htm.

6 ‘1995 NPT Review Conference Package of Decisions’ available at http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org/legal/npt/1995dec.html#2.

7 ‘2000 NPT Review Conference Final Document’, http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2000_06/docjun; ‘2010 NPT Review Conference Final Document’, http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=NPT/CONF.2010/50%20(VOL.I).

8 President Bush's Statement on House Passage of India Civil Nuclear Cooperation Legislation, issued on July 27, 2006, http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/releases/2006/07/20060727-2.html.

9 The Consultative Group is the NSG's ‘standing intersessional working body’. See http://www.nuclearsuppliersgroup.org/activities.htm.

10 Daryl Kimball, ‘U.S. Proposal for Changes to Nuclear Suppliers Group Guidelines Circulated March 2006’, Arms Control Association, March 27, 2006.

11 Copy of the draft is available at http://www.armscontrol.org/projects/india/20060327_DraftNSGProposal.

12 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘India Bracing itself for American Draft’, The Hindu, July 26, 2008.

13 ‘David C. Mulford, U.S. Ambassador in India’, The Hindu, July 23, 2008.

14 ‘Pokhran's PM Slams the Deal: Not On’, Indian Express, July 21, 2005.

15 The copy of the draft is available at http://www.armscontrol.org/node/3274.

16 Boris Groendahl, ‘U.S. Proposes India Nuclear Waiver approval in Doubt’, Reuters, August 14, 2008.

17 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘NSG critics focus on non-proliferation benchmarks’, The Hindu, August 22, 2008.

18 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘Finding a Fix to the NSG's Code of Omerta’, The Hindu, August 23, 2008.

19 John Morris, ‘Austria to Keep Quiet over Indian Nuclear Ambitions’, austriantimes (Austria), August 11, 2008.

20 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘Tighten Draft Waiver for India’, The Hindu, August 16, 2008.

21 Mary Fitzgerald, ‘Ireland Cautious on Nuclear Trade Deal for India’, Irish Times, August 22, 2008.

22 Mark Heinrich, ‘Nuclear Suppliers meet on U.S.–India Trade Deal’, Reuters, August 21, 2008.

23 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘India Says NSG Clearance is U.S. Responsibility’, The Hindu, August 23, 2008.

24 Ibid.

25 Siddhart Varadarajan, ‘Conditions Mooted for Indian Nuclear Waiver’, The Hindu, August 23, 2008.

26 Praful Bidwai, ‘Nuclear Deal Headed for Fiasco’, Inter Press Services (IPS), August 28, 2008.

27 Ibid.

28 Ibid.

29 The NSG has been debating tightening its guidelines in order to prevent the transfer of ENR technologies but failed to reach consensus due to objections from a few countries for various reasons. The NSG guidelines provided only for ‘restraint’ in the transfer of ENR technology.

30 ‘The NSG in a Time of Change: An Interview with NSG Chairman Piet de Klerk’, Arms Control Today (October 2011) Available at https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2011_10/Interview_NSG_Chairman_Piet_de_Klerk.

31 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘NSG Statement by the “Gang of Six”’, The Hindu, August 26, 2008.

32 UN Security Council Resolution 1172, India/Pakistan, June 6, 1998, http://www.un.org/Docs/scres/1998/scres98.htm.

33 Copy of the draft is available at http://www.armscontrol.org/node/3331.

34 Mark Heinrich, ‘Nuclear Nations approve disputed India trade waiver’, Reuters, September 6, 2008.

35 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘NSG meets again amidst rumblings of uncertainty’, The Hindu, September 4, 2008.

36 Ibid.

37 Ibid.

38 Statement by External Affairs Minister of India Shri Pranab Mukherjee on the Civil Nuclear Initiative. Available at http://www.mea.gov.in/mystart.php?id=290014162.

39 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘Last-ditch Talks on to Avert NSG Dead-end’, The Hindu, September 5, 2008.

40 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘Thirty Words that Saved the Day’, The Hindu, September 9, 2008.

41 Copy of the draft is available at http://www.armscontrol.org/node/3345.

42 Daryl Kimball, ‘Text, Analysis, and Response to NSG “Statement on Civil Nuclear Cooperation with India”’, Arms Control Association, September 6, 2008, http://www.armscontrol.org/node/3345.

43 J. Sri Raman, ‘How India's Nuclear “Waiver” was Won’, Truthout, September 9, 2008.

44 Heinrich, ‘Nuclear Nations Approve Disputed India Trade Waiver’.

45 Glenn Kessler, ‘World Nuclear Trade Group Agrees to Restrict’, Washington Post, September 12, 2008.

46 Siddharth Varadarajan, ‘NSG Waiver Enables Member States to Provide India Full Civil Nuclear Cooperation’, The Hindu, September 7, 2008.

47 Kimball, ‘Text, Analysis, and Response to NSG’.

48 Scott Baldauf, ‘First the US, Now China Tries to Woo India’, Christian Science Monitor, April 8, 2005.

49 Togzhan Kassenova, ‘Brazil's Nuclear Kaleidoscope: An Evolving Identity’, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, 2014, 58.

50 Mark Hibbs, ‘US Pressing for NSG Exemption for India by End of this Week’, Nucleonics Week 49, no. 34, August 21, 2008.

51 Heinrich, ‘Nuclear Nations Approve Disputed India Trade Waiver’.

52 Somini Sengupta and Mark Mazzetti, ‘Nuclear Suppliers Group Ends Ban on Trade’, New York Times, September 7, 2008.

53 Daniel Hornes, ‘Prospects of Nuclear Deal with Israel Dismissed’, Arms Control Today, 40 (September 2010). Available at https://www.armscontrol.org/act/2010_09/Israel.

54 Statement by S. Banerji at the 54th General Conference, Vienna, September 22, 2010, http://www.dae.gov.in/.

55 ‘US to support India's full membership in NSG’, Times of India, November 6, 2010.

56 India–US Joint Statement on November 8, 2010, http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2010/11/08/joint-statement-president-obama-and-prime-minister-singh-india.

57 ‘India Tightens Atomic Transfer Controls’, Global Security Newswire, March 14, 2013.

58 Nirupama Rao, Indian Ambassador to the United States, comments at 2013 Carnegie International Nuclear Policy Conference, April 8–9, 2013, http://carnegieendowment.org/2013/04/09/is-there-emerging-power-agenda/fx28.

59 Robert Einhorn, President of the Centre for Strategic and International Studies, argued that most of the steps India pledged in the India–US nuclear agreement are ‘simply reaffirmation of existing positions’. India was already observing the unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing: proponents of the deal argue that this agreement would bind India to honor that pledge while opponents note that the deal failed to bind India legally to sign the CTBT. India has supported FMCT negotiations for years, but the deal failed to commit it to halt the production of fissile material. Regarding enforcing effective export controls, India is already committed by UNSCR 1540 passed in April 2004 to adopt and enforce effective laws prohibiting the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Please see Statement by Robert J. Einhorn, Centre for Strategic and International Studies, ‘The U.S.–India Nuclear Deal: The Impact on Nonproliferation’, October 26, 2005. Available at http://csis.org/files/media/csis/congress/ts060426einhorn.pdf.

60 ‘Sarkozy backs India for UNSC, NSG’, Economic Times, December 4, 2010; ‘Germany Backs India for NSG Membership’, Economic Times, December 7, 2010; ‘Russia Backs India for NSG’, Hindustan Times, December 21, 2010; ‘Australia Commits NSG Support’, Indo-Asian News Service, May 3, 2012; Fredrik Dahl, ‘Britain Lobbies for Nuclear Export Group to Admit India’, Reuters, June 14, 2013.

61 Nuclear Suppliers Group Point of Contact Note, United States Communication – ‘Food for Thought’ Paper on Indian NSG Membership, May 23, 2011, http://www.armscontrol.org/system/files/nsg1130.pdf.

62 Daniel Hornes, ‘NSG Revises Rules on Sensitive Exports’, Arms Control Today (July/August 2011). Available at http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2013_0708/NSG-Revises-List-Continues-India-Debate.

63 Nuclear Suppliers Group, ‘On What Basis are Participation Decisions Taken?’, http://www.nuclearsuppliersgroup.org/en/participants1.

64 Dahl, ‘Britain Lobbies for Nuclear Export to Admit India’.

65 ‘Debate Persists over Indian Entry to Nuclear Export Group’, Nuclear Threat Initiative, March 21, 2013

66 Fredrik Dahl, ‘Nuclear States Divided on India Joining Export Control Group’, Reuters, March 20, 2013.

67 Daniel Hornes, ‘NSG Revises List, Continues India Debate’, Arms Control Today, July/August 2013.

68 Dahl, ‘Nuclear States Divided on India Joining Export Control Group’.

69 Pierre Goldschmidt and Toby Dalton, ‘Conditions on Indian NSG membership’, Proliferation Analysis, June 14, 2011.

70 Daryl Kimball, ‘New Nuclear Suppliers Rules a Net Plus’, Arms Control Today, July/August 2011.

71 Bharat Karnad, ‘India's Nuclear Amateurism’, New Indian Express, June 28, 2013, http://www.newindianexpress.com/columns/Indias-nuclear-amateurism/2013/06/28/article1655987.ece.

72 G. Balachandran, ‘India and the NSG: Approaches to Indian Membership’, Institute for Defence Studies and Analysis (IDSA), May 23, 2013.

73 ‘India to Lobby for Joining Nuclear Suppliers Group’, Global Security Newswire, January 31, 2011.

74 ‘India to Argue for Entry into Atomic Export Group’, Nuclear Threat Initiative, February 29, 2012.

75 ‘India's NSG Entry Unlikely Soon’, Financial Express, June 21, 2013.

76 Fred McGoldrick, ‘A Road Ahead for Export Controls: Challenges for the Nuclear Suppliers Group’, Arms Control Today (January/February 2011). Available at http://www.armscontrol.org/act/2011_01-02/McGoldrick.

77 Daniel Painter, ‘The Nuclear Suppliers Group at the Crossroads’, The Diplomat, June 10, 2013.