No Indian-style nuclear deal for Pakistan

No Indian-style nuclear deal for Pakistan

By Khalid Hasan

WASHINGTON: The United States has no intention of offering Pakistan the kind of nuclear cooperation deal it signed with India in July this year, according to Nicholas Burns, under secretary of state.

Testifying before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee on Wednesday, Burns, who was in New Delhi two weeks ago, when asked if a similar deal may be demanded by Pakistan, replied, “We have an important relationship with Pakistan. We are not offering the same deal to Pakistan, for a variety of reasons. As said by Secretary (of State Condoleezza) Rice, it is necessary to dehyphenate our policy in South Asia. For a long term, it has been a zero sum nature of relationship in the region. It is time to have a full-blown relationship with Pakistan in counter-terrorism, but with India, we can have a separate relationship.”

He said the July 18 accord with India, signed when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh paid an official visit to Washington, is a strategic relationship in the civil nuclear field. He disclosed that Rice met President Pervez Musharraf at the UN and briefed him about the deal with India. Asked if Pakistan would accept the emerging relationship between the US and India, he replied he could not say if Pakistan is happy about it or Gen Musharraf is happy about it, but some Pakistani officials have stated that they would like the US to have a similar relationship with their country. He called the deal with India a “unique arrangement”.

After his testimony, in an informal chat with journalists covering the hearing, he was asked by this correspondent what Gen Musharraf had said to Rice when she briefed him on the Indo-US nuclear agreement of July 18. He declined an answer. It is learnt that Pakistan’s reaction so far has been “businesslike”.

No Pakistani embassy representative was present at the hearing, which took place in a room packed to capacity.

On Kashmir, Burns said he did not see the US role as “mediatory”. Kashmir, he added, is a sensitive issue. “In the wake of the recent devastating earthquake, India has extended assistance to Pakistan, which is a welcome sign. This is a very slow rapprochement. We will help if we can. In fact, behind the scenes, we have been helpful. Pakistan-India relations have registered an improvement,” he said.