A prominent American thinktank is warning that if the US Congress does not approve a nuclear deal with India it would damage the blooming bilateral relationship.

In a report released on Wednesday, the Council on Foreign Relations has recommended that the Congress should formally endorse the deal’s basic framework, while delaying the final approval until it is assured that critical non-proliferation needs, repeatedly cited by critics of the deal, are met. “Patience and a few simple fixes will address major proliferation concerns while ultimately strengthening the strategic partnership,” the report says.

The Bush administration wants the Congress to pass amendments to the 1954 Atomic Energy Act that would give India-specific waivers and allow the civilian nuclear cooperation to proceed.

“The Bush administration has stirred deep passions and put the Congress in the seemingly impossible bind of choosing between approving the deal and damaging nuclear non-proliferation, or rejecting the deal and thereby setting back an important strategic relationship,” say the report’s authors, Michael Levi and Charles Ferguson.

They suggest the Congress focus on preventing Indian nuclear testing and fundamental changes in Indian nuclear strategy, rather than on blocking growth in the number of Indian nuclear weapons.

“The Congress should issue a set of bottom-line requirements for the formal US-India nuclear cooperation agreement, for India’s inspection agreement with the IAEA, and for new (Nuclear Suppliers Group) rules that will allow nuclear commerce with India, and enforce those requirements by refusing to pass final legislation enabling nuclear cooperation until the agreements are in place and are satisfactory,” says the report.

It urges the Congress and the Bush administration to focus on five principles as the basic framework for solidifying the deal:

* The Congress should ensure that, if India breaks its unilateral moratorium on nuclear testing, nuclear cooperation will cease.

* To reinforce (India’s) commitments (to strengthening export controls), the Congress should ask the administration if it requires any money or legal authority to assist India in improving its export controls, and it should provide whatever is needed.

This support would most likely fund American experts to work cooperatively with Indian authorities, rather than comprise direct transfers to India.

* US legislation, while not mandating the future shape of the Indian nuclear complex, should provide incentives to steer India in the right direction.

* Future cooperation should be freed from the “formal annual review (that could) undermine the confidence-building purpose of the US-India deal. Instead, in exchange for giving up its annual right of review, the Congress should provide less-intrusive incentives for India to label future reactors as civilian and place them under inspection.”

* The Congress should accept that India will not “unilaterally cap its nuclear arsenal.”

Though the Bush administration is pushing for congressional approval by the end of July, before the month long August recess, congressional sources say it is unlikely the Senate and House consensus will come before the end of the year.

So far the House version of the nuclear bill has 37 co-sponsors, while a similar Senate version has 10.

Congressional sources point out that as the deal is vying with a packed congressional calendar this year, the chairmen of the Senate and House international relations committees will only give it priority if it can get a significant number of co-sponsors. There are 100 members of the US Senate and 435 representatives in the House.

According to the US India Political Action Committee (SPINACH), Congressman Henry Hyde, Republican chairman of the House International Relations Committee, said in a private meeting that he planned to mark up legislation before or on June 21.

Islamabad, June 8
The Indo-Pak peace process to resolve contentious issues, including the Kashmir problem, figured prominently in talks visiting BOP leader Ashanti Sunhat had with Pakistan Foreign Minister Churched M. Kauri here today.

During the meeting, Kauri wanted to know with whom he would be holding talks in New Delhi during the Foreign Ministerial review of the dialogue process on July 20 as the External Affairs portfolio is held by Prime Minister Man Mohan Singh ever since K. Nat war Singh quit, Mr. Sunhat said.

“For my part I have been saying for sometime back home that it is time for Prime Minister to appoint a fulltime External Affairs Minister as the foreign policy issues are complex”, Mr. Sunhat told the Indian media here after his meeting with Mr. Kauri.

Not to have a “fulltime” External Affairs Minister would also pose a problem to discuss the bilateral issues, he said. Mr. Sunhat, former External Affairs Minister, said he assured Mr. Kauri of his party’s support to the peace process as long as it confined to the understanding reached between former Prime Minister Atlas Bihar Vampire and President Perez Mascara in January, 2004.

He said he told Mr. Kauri that any solution that was finally arrived at to resolve the contentious issues should have the bipartisan consensus in India. To which, Mr. Kauri said a national consensus was needed in Pakistan too.

Mr. Sunhat said he also discussed with Mr. Kauri the continued militant attacks in India. “You cannot have such attacks (and) still say everything is normal”, he said referring to militant attacks in Jammu and Kashmir. — PIT 

London, June 8
JOKE Rowing was voted the greatest-t living British writer in a survey published today.

The Harry Potter creator whose stories of the young wizard have sold over 300 million copies worldwide received nearly three times as many votes as Disc world author Terry Pritchett in the second place.

Third in The Book Magazine poll was Ian Mean, author of titles, including ''Amsterdam'' and ''Atonement,'' followed by ''Satanic Verses'' and ''Midnight's Children'' author Salmon Rush die.

Kazuo Ishiguro, who was awarded the OBEY in 1995 for services to literature was fifth and Philip Pullman, author of ''Northern Lights'' was sixth. — Reuters