Senate version of nuke deal rises concern: Boucher

Washington, July 28: Conceding that a lot of concern has been expressed by officials both in India and in the United States about certain provisions incorporated in the Senate version of the Indo-US civil nuclear deal, a top Bush administration officials said ''efforts are being made to keep it as close as possible to the House version which got a thumping majority on Wednesday.''

Talking to reporters here yesterday at the State Department Mr Boucher said,''The administration was equally concerned as India about not distorting the framework of the cooperation agreement as envisaged originally or go in for renegotiations. How the Senate would cope with it, was not sure.

''The Indian Govt has been concerned about the same things that the Bush administration has been in trying to legislatively get through the United States-India civilian nuclear cooperation agreement, and the bottom line is the implementation of the agreement that both sides signed on to and ensure that there is nothing to distort the arrangements that have been reached,'' Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia Richard Boucher said.

However, these matters could also be dealt with at the conferees level when the bill is discussed.'' Mr Boucher also expressed his happiness that the House gave such a handsome majority to the nuclear deal. He said, ''The State Department and Secretary Condoleezza Rice were 'delighted' about the outcome of the House legislation. The House of Representatives passed the US-India Nuclear Cooperation Promotion Act of 2006 by a margin of 339 to 68 votes.

''We very much appreciate the House Bill and the House vote. It accomplishes the central purpose of the legislation regarding the kind of cooperation we wanted with India and in a manner that does not require changes to the deal,'' he said.

The Lugar-Biden legislation on the civil nuclear deal has certain strict conditions on allowing the sale of sensitive technology and equipment to India, which is not a signatory to the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty NPT.

These provisions, broadly considered deal breakers, have created concern it could lead to re-negotiation on the initiative.

He also expressed the hope that the Senate would also expedite the legislative process so that the initiative could be in place before the end of September.

Mr Boucher, who left immediately after the press conference on a tour of Abu Dhabi, Dubai, India, Bangladesh as well as China, said soon after the House vote Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Nicholas Burns had called Foreign Secretary Shyam Saran on the phone.

Regarding negotiations within the Nuclear Supplier Group (NSG) to accommodate guidelines to include India he said, ''Many members wanted to wait and see how the legislation regarding the civil nuclear cooperation initiative shaped up.''

UNI