Indo-US N-talks end sans announcement

Three days of consultations between the US and Indian officials over the 123 agreement which would operationalise the Indo-US civil nuclear agreement ended without any big announcement although foreign secretary Shiv Shankar Menon pronounced himself satisfied with the progress of the talks.

Menon said the discussions were "productive" and "fruitful" and that the agreement was still a work in progress and needed more work. When reminded of US undersecretary of state Nicholas Burns' comment that the agreement was 90 per cent done, Menon demurred.

"It will be wrong to quantify the agreement in percentage terms. There is work to be done and there are no deadlines imposed on the completion of negotiations," he said.

"The final agreement will be within the parameters set by the July 18 declaration, the separation plan announced on March 6 and the statement by the prime minister before both Houses of Parliament," he said.

The long and short of it, according to sources in the Ministry of External Affairs is that the stumbling blocks of the deal remain, although some progress has been made.

According to top sources, the main stumbling block remains the reprocessing of spent nuclear fuel. Sources say US secretary of state, Condoleeza Rice might visit New Delhi in July this year to resolve the issue by detailing an agreement on technology transfer on spent fuel.

On the matter of testing too, a way seems to have been proposed around the problem. Sources say a separate consultative committee on nuclear testing and the problem of resultant sanctions will be set up as a way around that problem.

When one of the negotiators of the deal was asked whether a fresh draft has appeared, the answer was a terse "I hope not", reflecting the three days of exhaustive talks over what has become a difficult negotiations.

Menon took the time to say that there was nothing in the Hyde Act which held back what had been promised in the July 18th agreement. "If you ask me if I am satisfied with the progress so far, then yes I am," said Menon. Without a big announcement however, he seemed to be the only one.