Last-minute administrative hitches forced Condoleezza Rice, US secretary of state, to leave New Delhi at the weekend without signing the US-India nuclear deal to end more than three decades of isolation for India’s nuclear programme.
Ms Rice’s visit, on the heels of US Senate approval of the civil nuclear deal last week, had been widely billed as concluding the agreement after three years of tough negotiations. Opposition parties in India had even intended to make Saturday a day of mourning for what they perceive to be India’s capitulation to the US.
Ms Rice was at pains to stress that failure to ink the deal was not a sign it might yet unravel. “I don’t want anyone to think we have open issues. We don’t have open issues,” she said after talks with Pranab Mukherjee, India’s minister for external affairs, on Saturday.
Rather she blamed administrative delays in the US at a time when Congressional attention was focused on the $700bn (€507m, £394m) bail-out to stem the country’s financial crisis.
An opportunity last month for a signing by India’s prime minister Manmohan Singh and US president George W. Bush in Washington passed without Congressional approval.
The deal is now expected to be signed by Mr Bush on Wednesday. Cautious Indian negotiators have been keen for Mr Bush to sign the deal into US law and to publish a presidential statement before signing the agreement themselves.
The agreement allows US companies to provide India with technology for its civilian nuclear programme, ending an embargo in place since Delhi tested a nuclear weapon in 1974. It also gives India international status as an acceptable nuclear power, even though it is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty.
Delhi has undertaken to place its non-military nuclear facilities under international safeguards. But critics say the deal contains loopholes that could allow India to strengthen its nuclear weapons programme.
Throughout negotiations, India has resisted proposed amendments and riders to tighten these loopholes, including restrictions on transfer of certain types of technology and terms of reprocessing and fuel supply. In the final stages, Delhi has been particularly concerned as to whether the deal would stand if it were to conduct another test.
On arrival in New Delhi, Ms Rice said bureaucratic delays had made the signing impossible. “There are a lot of administrative details that have to be worked out. [The deal] was only passed in our Congress two days ago. The president is looking forward to signing the bill, sometime, I hope, very soon.”
The US House of Representatives passed the bill with a two-thirds majority, and the Senate approved it with more than a four-fifths majority.
“The civil nuclear energy initiative is now in its last lap,” said Mr Mukherjee.
