NPT regime flawed, says Jaswant

WASHINGTON, Aug 23 (PTI) — India will not accept a "flawed" non-proliferation regime as the international norm when all realities conclusively demand the contrary, Prime Minister’s special envoy Jaswant Singh has said on the eve of the fourth round of talks between India and the USA over adherence to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and other nuclear issues.

"Since the nuclear powers that assist or condone proliferation are subject to no penalty, the entire non-proliferation regime became flawed.... And the range of options for India narrowed," Mr Jaswant Singh said while defending New Delhi’s nuclear tests conducted in May last.

Calling for a "universal security paradigm for the entire globe", he said in an article in New York based Foreign Affairs: "The Sino-Pakistani nuclear weapons collaboration, a flagrant violation of the NPT, made it obvious that the NPT regime had collapsed in India’s neighbourhood, nor was the CTBT helpful."

India, he said, "Still lives in a rough neighbourhood", and it was "left with no choice but to update and validate the capability that had been demonstrated 24 years ago in the nuclear test of 1974." India’s May 1998 tests violated no international treaty or obligations, he added.

According to Mr Jaswant Singh, "The challenge to Indian statecraft is to reconcile India’s security imperatives with valid international concerns regarding nuclear weapons."

Mr Jaswant Singh said, "Chinese and Pakistani proliferation was no secret. Despite this, the Clinton administration was still willing to certify that China was not proliferating and — even worse for India — US was either unable or unwilling to restrain Beijing."

According to Mr Jaswant Singh "India, the only country sandwiched between two nuclear weapons states, has acted in a timely fashion to correct an imbalance in power in Asia and fill a potentially dangerous vacuum. It endeavours to contribute to a stable balance of power in Asia, which it holds will further the advance of democracy.

"A more powerful India will help balance and connect the oil-rich Gulf region and the rapidly industrialising countries of southeast Asia," Mr Jaswant Singh said.

Reiterating that India’s nuclear weapons are for "self defence, to ensure that New Delhi, too, is not subjected to nuclear coercion", Mr Jaswant Singh said, "it would be a great error to assume that simply advocating the new mantra of globalisation and the market makes national security subservient to global trade.

"The 21st century will not be the century of trade. The world still has to address the unfinished agenda of the centuries," he said.

Since the nuclear weapons are not really usable, he said, "The dilemma lies, paradoxically in their continuing deterrent value.....India’s nuclear tests were to assert that it is impossible to have two standards for national security — one based on nuclear deterrence and the other outside it."

Mr Jaswant Singh said, "India is now a nuclear weapons state, as is Pakistan. That reality can neither be denied nor wished away. The category of 'nuclear weapons state' is not, in actuality, a conferment. Nor is it a status for others to grant. It is rather an objective reality."

However, Mr Jaswant Singh reiterated India’s desire to enter into a no-first-use agreement with any country, either negotiated bilaterally or in a collective forum. It remains committed to "the basic tenet of its foreign policy — a conviction that global elimination of nuclear weapons will enhance its security as well as that of the rest of the world.

India will continue to urge countries, particularly other nuclear weapons states, to adopt measures that would contribute meaningfully to such an objective. It is "the cornerstone of India’s nuclear doctrine," he said.

On the issue of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, he said "After the tests, India stated that it will henceforth observe a voluntary moratorium and refrain from conducting underground nuclear test explosions. It has also indicated a willingness to move toward a de jure formalisation of this declaration. The basic obligation of the CTBT is thus met: to undertake no more nuclear tests."

Yeltsin sacks Kiriyenko government

MOSCOW, Aug 23 (PTI) — President Boris Yeltsin today dismissed Russian Prime Minister Sergei Kiriyenko and his Cabinet after five months in office bringing back conservative Viktor Chernomyrdin who before that had served as the premier for five years.

The terse announcement by Kremlin about Mr Kiriyenko's dismissal gave no reason for the action.

The government of 35-year-old technocrat Kiriyenko came under fire on Friday from Communist-dominated Duma, lower house of parliament, at its emergency session for "failing" to solve the economic crisis. The Duma also demanded Mr Yeltsin's resignation.

Mr Yeltsin's decision to bring back 60-year-old Chernomyrdin, who was fired on March 23 after a five-year stint as Prime Minister, is subject to Duma's approval. Speculations about the return of Mr Chernomyrdin were rife ever since the devaluation of rouble and they gained strength when he returned to Moscow on Monday cutting short his vacation at Black Sea resort of Sochi.

The five-month stint of Mr Kiriyenko was marked by economic turmoil leading to a 90-day moratorium on repayment of foreign loans, rescheduling of huge domestic debt, upheavals in the stock market and finally the de facto devaluation of rouble by 30 to 50 per cent.

Mr Gennady Seleznyov, the Communist speaker of Duma, immediately welcomed Mr Chernomyrdin's return.

Interfax news agency reported that Mr Chernomyrdin was already holding consultations on forming a new government.