New Delhi, June 23 (IANS) Amid India’s concerns over the China-Pakistan nuclear deal, the European Union’s chief diplomat Catherine Ashton said Wednesday that any such arrangement should respect the IAEA guidelines.
‘The EU is not a member of the NSG (Nuclear Suppliers Group). The EU wants to ensure that the proliferation of nuclear technologies does not take place,’ Ashton, on a four-day visit to India, told reporters here.
She was responding to a question on the EU’s stand on a Chinese plan to build two new nuclear reactors for Pakistan, which is expected to be taken up by the NSG at its plenary in New Zealand Thursday.
‘The EU has no problems with peaceful use of nuclear energy. Whatever arrangements are made have to be within the purview of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA),’ said Ashton, the EU’s high representative for foreign affairs and security policy and the first vice president of the European Commission.
Ashton held delegation-level talks with External Affairs Minister S.M. Krishna and called on Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Tuesday to firm up the agenda of the forthcoming India-EU summit in Brussels in October.
She met Overseas Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi and Home Minister P. Chidambaram and discussed issues relating to immigration and counter-terrorism.
Concerned about the China-Pakistan nuclear deal, India has sought more details from Beijing and has conveyed its reservations to influential countries of the NSG, many of whom are members of the nuclear cartel which controls the flow of global atomic trade.
India signed its first bilateral civil nuclear deal with France in September 2008, following a waiver by the NSG that exempted New Delhi from the current rules of global nuclear commerce which forbids such trade with countries that have not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
China has confirmed that Chinese and Pakistani officials have signed an agreement to finance the construction of two nuclear reactors to be built by the China National Nuclear Corp at Chashma in Pakistan.
China earlier built two reactors for Pakistan before joining the NSG in 2004.
