Shyam Saran leads MEA blitz

JYOTI MALHOTRA

New Delhi, August 9, 2007 : Former foreign secretary and PM’s special envoy Shyam Saran will lead a Foreign Office blitzkrieg, as of this weekend, to key countries of the Nuclear Suppliers Group to rally support for the Indo-US nuclear deal.

Saran is travelling to Russia, Germany, Brazil and Argentina from Sunday itself, while the two seniormost secretaries in the ministry of external affairs, Nalin Surie and N. Ravi, besides the Foreign Secretary, will share the rest of the 45-member NSG between themselves.

Although the 123 agreement makes clear that NSG clearance for the deal is a responsibility of the US, India clearly wants to marshal support so that all sides are covered.

Leading the list of countries to watch out for is China, although Austria, Sweden, Denmark and New Zealand are also said to have been critical of US efforts to bring India into the nuclear sanctum sanctorum.

But MEA officials pointed out that ``there’s a huge difference between before and after. Once the deal has been done, it will be a completely different sight to see who actually opposes the Americans.’’

Simultaneously, Anil Kakokdar’s Department of Atomic Energy, which played a key role in the 123 negotiations, will launch its own initiative with the IAEA so as to deliver an India-specific safeguards agreement.

The NSG, which takes its role as a watchdog body seriously, requires a consensus to clear the deal. Once that happens, as does the IAEA agreement, the 123 will return to the US Congress for an up-down vote.

The choice of Russia as the first country to which India is sending an envoy is said to signal Delhi’s keenness to show them the 123 agreement first-hand. Moreover, Moscow has been named as one of three alternative suppliers for nuclear fuel, just in case India conducts a nuclear test and the US stops all cooperation. This, officials said, only underlines Moscow’s importance for the Indo-US deal.

Germany is key because it will become the president of the NSG in a few months, Brazil is part of the India-Brazil-South Africa (IBSA) triumvirate and Argentina is a major nation in South America.

Still, all eyes are on China and how it will respond to the overt Indian request for support for the deal.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Li Jiancho indicated to PTI in Beijing a couple of days ago that Beijing’s views may be different from 2005 when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and President George Bush had first signed the agreement.

``It is hoped that the international community can explore and properly handle the issue by creative thinking,’’ Liu said.

Former Chinese ambassador to Indian Cheng Ruisheng said he believed that this showed that Beijing would not adopt a ``dogmatic’’ stance, said PTI.

Two years ago, though, the official Chinese media had been very critical, saying that it would ``deal a hard blow to America’s leading role in the global proliferation prevention system.’’

ENDS