“After protracted negotiations, the NSG today adopted an exemption for nuclear exports to India,” the Austrian Foreign Ministry said in a statement.
“There is a sense of relief. I am particularly happy that the waiver (for India) meets with international nuclear non-proliferation architecture,” Peter Launsky, Austrian foreign ministry spokesman said after an unscheduled meeting of the NSG here.
Austria, along with Ireland, New Zealand and Switzerland had expressed strong reservations over the waiver being given to India that forced the grouping to have an unscheduled meeting on Saturday after two days of deliberations failed to produce a consensus.
The nuclear deal is now headed for the US Congress, which meets on September 8 to discuss an approval for the 123 India-US bilateral agreement which will bring the landmark nuclear deal to its closure over three years after it was first conceptualised.
The two countries are expected to formally sign the bilateral pact, likely when Manmohan Singh goes to Washington towards the end of September, that will restore nuclear trade with the US after a gap of 34 years.
Economic sanctions were imposed by the US and the rest of the world when India first conducted its nuclear test in 1974.
The NSG’s waiver also frees India to sign bilateral civil nuclear cooperation agreements with France and Russia, leading advocates of the nuclear deal, who also used their clout to win over sceptics in the nuclear cartel.
Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is set to sign bilateral civil nuclear cooperation with France when he goes to Paris for bilateral talks Sep 30 after attending the India-EU summit in the coastal resort town of Marseilles.
The bilateral civil nuclear cooperation agreement with Russia, which was finalized last year and iniatialled early this year, will be signed when Russian President Dmitry Medvedev comes to New Delhi in November this year.
India’s External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee’s statement Thursday re-affirming New Delhi’s commitment to a “voluntary moratorium” on future testing boosted India’s case in the NSG and was praised as “very significant”.
“This is a very significant statement which was discussed by members of the NSG and praised and welcomed by those in attendance,” US Assistant Secretary for Arms Control and International Security Affairs John Rood told reporters at the end of the of Friday’s morning session of the NSG. — Agencies
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