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India to pay a price for nuclear test: Saran
Rajeev Sharma
Tribune News Service

New Delhi, July 14
Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran today cautioned that India would have to pay a price if it were to break the moratorium on further nuclear tests.

“If this has to be done, I am sure, the government will decide in the supreme national interest,” Mr Saran said while speaking at a discussion on “Indo-US Joint Statement of July 2005: A Year Later”.

The Foreign Secretary’s statement assumes significance in the larger context of the Indo-US civilian nuclear cooperation deal. Both houses of US Congress are expected to vote on a Bill later this month, which if passed, would amend the US legislation that has debarred the US from doing nuclear commerce with India for over four decades.

An important feature of the Bills that passed muster at the Senate Committee and the House committee last month is that the deal would become a dead letter if India were to test another nuclear device.