With the waiver from Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) in hand, the UPA government today indicated it would be moving fast on signing civil-nuclear agreements with France and Russia. The government also said it had commenced preliminary dialogue with American companies for nuclear trade.
The agreements with France and Russia were finalised soon after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President George Bush signed the Indo-US civil nuclear agreement in Washington in 2005.
However, both the European countries were waiting for New Delhi to obtain the NSG waiver on nuclear commerce before inking the deals.
Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) spokesperson Navtej Sarna today said the “government is also moving towards finalising bilateral agreements with other friendly partner countries such as France and Russia”.
While the Indo-US deal is awaiting to be ratified by the US Congress this month-end to become operational, the government in New Delhi has already started the process of procuring nuclear technologies and fuel from the US.
“We have informed the US about our intent to source state-of-the-art nuclear technologies and facilities from the US, based on the provisions of the 123 Agreement,” Sarna said.
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He said while actual cooperation with the US would start after “the 123 Agreement comes into force, the Nuclear Power Corporation of India has already commenced a preliminary dialogue with US companies in this regard”.
Sarna’s statement is clearly intended to nudge forward the US Congress’ ratification of the 123 Agreement within its current schedule and silence some critics of the agreement who might be tempted to move amendments.
New Delhi has plans to generate 40,000 Mw of nuclear power within the next two decades by sourcing technologies and fuel from the US, France and Russia. France produces 79 per cent of its power through 59 reactors.
Russia, which has recently launched a massive programme to augment its nuclear power generation, has 25 reactors which produce 16 per cent of the country’s power.