In 2010, the American 秋葵视频 joined with Stanford University鈥檚 Center for International Security and Cooperation to assess game-changing events that would fundamentally alter the future of nuclear energy. The workshop on game changers was part of the 秋葵视频鈥檚 ongoing Global Nuclear Future Initiative, which explores the possibility of international cooperation and collaboration with regard to nuclear energy. The workshop convened officials from government, industry, the national labs, and academia to discuss the potential game changers that could result from innovations in the fuel cycle and in reactor designs, or from a military attack, a terrorist event, a catastrophic accident, or a natural disaster.
Six-and-a-half months after that meeting, an earthquake and tsunami crippled the Fukushima nuclear complex in Japan and had an impact on nuclear energy deployment worldwide.
On October 25, 2011, the 秋葵视频 convened a panel of global experts at Stanford University. Scott D. Sagan (Stanford University), Harald M眉ller (Frankfurt Peace Research Institute and Goethe-University), Noramly bin Muslim (National University of Malaysia), Olli Heinonen (Harvard Kennedy School; formerly, International Atomic Energy Agency), and Jayantha Dhanapala (Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs) considered the global nuclear future in light of the accident at Fukushima. The panel discussion served as the 秋葵视频鈥檚 1975th Stated Meeting. The following is an edited transcript of the discussion.
Scott D. Sagan
Scott D. Sagan is the Caroline S.G. Munro Professor of Political Science at Stanford University, where he is also a Senior Fellow in the Freeman Spogli Institute and Codirector Emeritus of the Center for International Security and Cooperation. He has been a Fellow of the American 秋葵视频 since 2008. He serves as Codirector of the 秋葵视频鈥檚 Global Nuclear Future Initiative.
The nuclear future has become both more complex and more uncertain since the March 2011 Fukushima Daiichi accident. A small number of countries 鈥 including Germany, Italy, Israel, Venezuela, and Myanmar 鈥 have announced that they will end their existing nuclear power programs or stop their planned programs; many others have announced that they will move forward or even expand their civilian nuclear energy programs. The United Arab Emirates, for example, broke ground on its new nuclear reactor site immediately after the Fukushima Daiichi accident, and the United States and Russia, while not starting construction of new nuclear power plants, approved a number of 鈥渓ifetime-extension鈥 programs of existing reactors after March 2011. Some states have even used the Japanese accident to argue that their new nuclear facilities are better than older plants. Iran, for example, announced that its new Russian-supplied reactor is the safest reactor in the world.
To help us understand the nuclear future, we have put together a distinguished, diverse, and international panel of specialists. Harald M眉ller is Director of the Frankfurt Peace Research Institute and Professor of International Relations at Goethe-University in Frankfurt. In 1995, 2000, 2005, and 2010, he participated as a member of the German delegation to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Conference. Noramly bin Muslim is Professor Emeritus in the Department of Science and Technology at the National University of Malaysia. He is the former Chairman of the Malaysian Atomic Energy Licensing Board and former Deputy Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and Head of its Department of Technical Assistance and Cooperation. He has also served as Head of the Malaysian Nuclear Research Center. Olli Heinonen is a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. Previously, he served for twenty-seven years at the IAEA in Vienna. Until five years ago, he was Deputy Director-General of the iaea and Head of its Department of Safeguards, where he was responsible for, among many things, efforts to shut down A. Q. Khan鈥檚 nuclear proliferation network and efforts to monitor and contain Iran鈥檚 nuclear program. Finally, Jayantha Dhanapala is President of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs. His previous posts include Senior Advisor to the President of Sri Lanka, Sri Lankan Ambassador to the United States and to Mexico, and UN Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs. In 1995, he was President of the NPT Review Conference, in which the indefinite extension of the NPT was negotiated.
I will start with a question for Harald. After the Fukushima accident, the German government was one of a handful of governments around the world to announce that it would phase out all domestic production of nuclear energy. Why was that decision made, is it likely to stick, and is it also influencing German nuclear export policy?
Harald M眉ller
Harald M眉ller is Director of the Frankfurt Peace Research Institute and Professor of International Relations at Goethe-University in Frankfurt.
Germany鈥檚 decision to end domestic production of nuclear energy came at the end of a long road leading in that direction; Fukushima was simply the last nail in the coffin. Recall that in 1957, Germany made a secret agreement with France and Italy to jointly create the bomb. Germany resigned from this effort when it joined the NPT and, as compensation, turned to unrestrained use of civilian nuclear power, including unrestrained exports. That decision was based on a national consensus. The change in Germany鈥檚 outlook on nuclear energy started with a grassroots movement in the mid-1970s that gave birth to the Green Party. After that, the Social Democrats left the national consensus, and suddenly, two major parties were against nuclear power. More remarkable was the fate of German fuel-cycle policy under the conservative Kohl government. We gave up on commercial reprocessing. We scrapped the experimental reprocessing plant, the commercial fast breeder (which is now the center of a holiday park), and the experimental breeder. We gave up on MOX fuel production and the high-temperature reactor, turning to full-scope safeguards as a condition of the supply of nuclear and related dual-use goods, strengthening export controls, and negotiating and signing the NPT鈥檚 Additional Protocol.
Then the Red-Green government, which was unnoticed in most parts of the world, decided to phase out nuclear energy. After long negotiations, the government made an agreement with the four utilities holding nuclear power plants. The phaseout was to be effected by 2030. The utilities agreed, tongue-in-cheek, because they were waiting for a new conservative government, and not for nothing: when Angela Merkel came to power, she and members of the liberal party negotiated an extended phaseout in what was actually a bonanza for the utilities. Public protests ensued, and at that moment, Fukushima happened. Public opinion polls showed that some 70 percent of Germans held antinuclear views. The conservatives lost an election in a crucial state where conservative governments had essentially been in power since the Middle Ages. Within two weeks, the liberals and the conservatives completely reversed their policy and decided to accelerate the phase-out, closing down six plants in straightforward fashion.
Is that decision reversible? I don鈥檛 believe so. We have two parties, Red and Green, for which being antinuclear is a matter of their identity. We have two other parties that cannot afford another turnabout of that sort. For the foreseeable future, we have a strongly antinuclear government, and the four big utilities have an incentive to prevent a brownout or blackout because the entire country would accuse them of intentionally manufacturing such an event. They are also facing a great deal of competition from small utilities at the local level.
Does it impact our exports? Sure it does; it has been doing so for a while. Germany has not exported nuclear facilities for some time, but I do not think it will cease to export equipment, materials, and technology that can be used in nuclear power plants or other facilities. Our industry is always capable of producing dual-use goods, which are bound to entail proliferation risks.
I think that we will phase out domestic production of nuclear energy. Usually, when we undertake a project of that size, we do it successfully, for better or worse, and maybe we will be the shining example for countries like Belgium and Switzerland, or other countries that want to phase out, in the future.
Question from Scott Sagan:
Noramly, how has the Fukushima accident influenced prospects for the development of civilian nuclear power in Southeast Asia? Which countries in the region are likely to move forward and develop nuclear power plants, and from whom will they purchase the technology?
Noramly bin Muslim
Noramly bin Muslim is Professor Emeritus in the Faculty of Science and Technology at the National University of Malaysia. Formerly he served as Chairman of the Malaysian Atomic Energy Licensing Board and as Deputy Director-General of the IAEA.
The Fukushima accident does affect the nuclear programs within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). Of the ten ASEAN countries, seven had indicated their interest in moving forward with a nuclear power program. Vietnam has indicated that it will proceed with its program; so has Malaysia, though the Malaysian program will maintain a low profile. Thailand has indicated that it will put its program on hold for at least two years. Indonesia has also indicated interest in nuclear energy, but because of Fukushima, the country is dragging its feet due to public concern. Singapore is still doing feasibility studies. The Philippines had plans to revive its currently inactive nuclear power plant, but now has decided not to proceed. Fukushima has indeed had an effect within the region.
In Malaysia, for example, we have proceeded with our tender documents. The first tender that we awarded was to an Austrian company that will look into the legal and regulatory requirements to go forward with nuclear power. We have also asked the law faculty of the National University of Malaysia to study the legal requirements for Malaysia to move ahead with the next phase. In fact, the next phase has already begun: we invited ten international contractors to compete for the tender on siting, the feasibility study, and the preparation of the bid documents. Unfortunately, after the accident at Fukushima, two companies withdrew from the tender; but we have evaluated the remaining companies and are working on the details. With the election around the corner, however, we cannot make the announcement just yet. So the project is being put on hold at the moment.
We have not decided the country from which we will acquire the necessary technologies, but a number of suppliers and vendors have come to Malaysia to give presentations and engage in discussions, as well as to recruit some of our citizens to visit and be trained at their companies. Japan, Korea, and France have more or less offered their technologies to us. Once our consultant prepares the bid document, and once that bid goes out, we will decide from which country to purchase. In the meantime, we have moved ahead with our training program, human resource development, and public relations efforts to create public awareness and acceptance. We have sent politicians and parliamentarians to Korea, Japan, and France. There are also people from the United States who have a special interest in some of the matters related to nuclear energy in Malaysia.
In terms of organization, Malaysia follows the procedures and guidelines prepared by the IAEA, and we also hire some consultants. Originally, we had nineteen possible sites; an initial evaluation by consultants from Korea brought the number of potential sites to five, and after a second evaluation, to three. Now we have three sites to present to the consultants selected to conduct feasibility studies. So we are moving ahead. And after the election, we hope to move ahead at full speed.
Question from Scott Sagan:
Olli, since the Fukushima accident, the Iranian government has both begun its operations at what it claims is the safest nuclear power plant in the world, the Bushehr nuclear reactor, and enriched uranium up to 20 percent at the Natanz facility, claiming that it is for the research reactor in Tehran. Given your experience as former Deputy Director-General of the IAEA, your comments expressing your concern that Iran is committed to developing a nuclear weapons option have been widely represented in the press. Why has the international community, and the IAEA more specifically, been unable to stop Iran鈥檚 uranium enrichment program? What do you hope 鈥 and what do you predict 鈥 will happen with respect to Iran鈥檚 nuclear program in the coming year?
Olli Heinonen
Olli Heinonen is a Senior Fellow at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School. He is former Deputy Director-General of the IAEA and Head of its Department of Safeguards.
I will address the topic in three parts. First, what led the IAEA to the conclusion that Iran is in noncompliance with its safeguards agreement, why did the IAEA refer this problem to the UN Security Council, and what are the subsequent resolutions and remaining concerns? Second, what does the Iranian nuclear program consist of today? Third, and most difficult, what will it consist of a year from now?
Iran conducted nuclear experiments for almost twenty years without reporting some of its activities under its comprehensive safeguards agreement with the IAEA. When these clandestine operations became public in late 2002 and 2003, instead of admitting its deficiencies, Iran took the route of denial and deception, which had a tremendous impact on the international community and the atmosphere in the IAEA. Then, for a period of time between the end of 2003 and 2004, Iran implemented provisionally the Additional Protocol of the IAEA and provided also a declaration about its past nuclear program. Unfortunately, this declaration was not complete. Iran omitted essential details from its documentation, such as the so-called P-2 centrifuge program.
Parallel to that development, information related to the military aspects of the program began to surface. Though not all nuclear weapons-related, those military aspects clearly indicated that the Iranian military establishment was involved in the r&d and the procurement of materials for the civil nuclear program 鈥 providing certain services and manufacturing components, for example. In 2004, 2005, and 2006, experiments that could be relevant to the development of nuclear weapons came to light. These activities included high-explosive tests, missile reentry vehicle design, and neutron physics experiments.
The IAEA Board asked Iran to suspend its enrichment activities until these questions were resolved. Unfortunately, Iran did not heed to that request, and the UN Security Council took up the issue. The Security Council has issued six resolutions since then, but rather than complying, Iran has been slowly building its enrichment capabilities while leaving all the questions about military-related activities unanswered. From 2007 until Summer 2008, the IAEA Secretariat was able to talk about these military aspects, but since then, there has been no constructive discussion with Iran.
Iran started larger-scale uranium enrichment in early 2007 in Natanz. Today, the growth of its capabilities has been less like a hundred-yard dash and more like a marathon run. Although the enrichment program is a matter of concern, we feel that, because Iran has been building its nuclear capabilities slowly, we still have time to solve the problem before it gets out of hand. Consider these facts: Natanz has about six thousand IR-1 centrifuges. They have produced about five tons of uranium hexafluoride (UF6), which is 3.5 percent enriched. At that level, the work of creating high-enriched uranium, which is needed for weapons purposes, is 75 percent complete. Five tons, or ten thousand pounds, of UF6 is enough to power perhaps four nuclear weapons, depending on the design and sophistication of those weapons. Iran has no urgent reason for enriching its uranium. Iran can wait for the questions surrounding its program to be resolved before continuing the enrichment program. In addition, the performance of its centrifuges has been fairly poor. Indeed, output has declined in the last year.
But also during this past year, Iran took one more step, raising additional concern. The country has produced 3.5 percent enriched uranium and fed it to another cascade system, which has been producing 20 percent enriched uranium. If the goal is to create high-enriched uranium at 90 percent enrichment, achieving 20 percent enrichment means that 90 percent of the work is done. If at some point Iran decides to leave the NPT, the time frame in which the country is vulnerable to international actions will decrease considerably.
According to recent IAEA reports, the poor performance of Iran鈥檚 centrifuges is perhaps good news. To produce a single nuclear weapon 鈥 using a scheme that I believe they must have taken from A.Q. Khan 鈥 it will take a half-year for those nearly six thousand machines to shift from 3.5 percent to 90 percent enriched uranium. Iran will not likely desert from its commitments in the next year or so because it does not have the technical means to do so. Thus, the international community can use this time to its advantage and negotiate a solution with Iran.
The needs of the Tehran research reactor have been used to justify the 20 percent enriched uranium production. But Iran has another approach that has not received much attention: the heavy-water reactor it is building in Arak. When Iran announced construction of the reactor to the IAEA in 2003 (Iran reconfirmed its plans a month ago), the reactor was supposed to replace the Tehran research reactor. It is odd to produce fuel for a reactor that is supposedly being replaced. Moreover, the Tehran research reactor was built in the 1960s, so it is fifty years old, and is located in an area that is vulnerable to earthquakes. For safety reasons, the reactor should be somewhere else. So the justifications for the enrichment program do not add up.
The numbers I have discussed suggest that Iran has enough material to build nuclear weapons. Yet what remains unclear is the actual route that Iran is pursuing. All the low-enriched uranium from Natanz feeds the 20 percent enriched uranium. At this point, the entire enrichment program is dedicated to producing 20 percent enriched uranium. Iran has announced that it will triple its production. By the end of 2012, it will have about two hundred kilos of 20 percent enriched uranium. By comparison, the five tons of low-enriched uranium probably presents the greater proliferation concern. Can Iran make the 20 percent enriched uranium faster? Based on the information the IAEA has in its reports 鈥 and provided that Iran is not engaged in any additional efforts to build nuclear capacity 鈥 it is not very likely that the country can boost its capacities considerably in the next year. The development of an advanced centrifuge has also been lagging behind. Considering that experiments began in 2007, Iran should by now have a small, semi-industrial demonstration plant 鈥 which it does not. It has only just begun to feed the first cascades. We have time, but that time will probably run out in 2013.
The commissioning of new advanced centrifuges will be the game changer in Iran鈥檚 capacity. Regardless of how well the centrifuges perform, they will be five times more powerful than the current IR-1s. Everything will multiply by four or five over that time period.
Question from Scott Sagan:
Jayantha, in another post-Fukushima development, the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) decided in June 2011 to adopt more restrictive criteria for countries exporting nuclear technology. Those countries must use the criteria to determine which nations can acquire sensitive nuclear technology. Can you briefly outline those criteria and explain how world governments are reacting to them? For example, are the criteria considered a violation of Article iv of the NPT, which gives countries the right to acquire nuclear technology? Will efforts to sign civilian nuclear agreements with India further complicate the matter?
Jayantha Dhanapala
Jayantha Dhanapala is President of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs. Previously he served as Senior Advisor to the President of Sri Lanka, UN Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs, and Sri Lankan Ambassador to the United States and to Mexico. He was President of the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference and the 1984 Conference on Disarmament.
A broad swath of countries in the global South belonging to the Non-Aligned Movement have no nuclear-weapon ambitions but want to use nuclear power for peaceful purposes, particularly in the service of developing their countries. They see the NSG as a self-appointed cartel that has decided, without consulting them, on guidelines to prevent the export of dual-use technology. When the NSG formed around 1974, it established the Zangger Committee Trigger List of exports subject to safeguards and controls. It was understood that by applying for access to exports on that list, a country was, in effect, indicating its ambitions to become a nuclear weapon state. Therefore, the approval process had to be treated very cautiously. Second, the NSG outlined Dual-Use Guidelines, which also call for special attention to export applications for components that could lead to a nuclear weapons program.
In June 2011, the NSG 鈥 which has now grown to forty-six members and includes developing countries like Brazil and Argentina as well as China (which for a long time had declined to join) 鈥 met in the Netherlands to approve a revised set of guidelines for exports relating to uranium enrichment and spent-fuel reprocessing and technology. The new rules effectively bar exports to states that have not signed or are not in compliance with the NPT, that have not instituted comprehensive IAEA safeguards, and that do not allow extensive monitoring under the terms of the Additional Protocol, among other criteria.
The statement issued after this meeting was brief; it did not explicitly lay out the new guidelines, but it agreed to strengthen the guidelines on the transfer of sensitive enrichment and reprocessing (ENR) technologies. It talked about the Brasilia Plenary decision to review the status of adherence to the Additional Protocol and went on to make several other points. But it was not until July, in a communication from the president of the NSG to the IAEA, that the amendments were spelled out. The revisions consisted of a change in paragraphs six and seven of the Part 1 guidelines. Paragraph six discussed special controls on sensitive exports and called on supplier states to exercise a policy of restraint in the transfer of sensitive facilities, equipment, technology, and material usable for nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. The new guidelines specify the above-mentioned scenarios in which states would be deemed ineligible to receive exports. Section 6C details the exemptions that can be made, including exemptions to cooperative enrichment enterprises such as the agreement between Brazil and Argentina, ABACC (Brazilian-Argentine Agency of Nuclear Materials Accounting and Control).
Commentators have noted that, in the past, members of the NSG were asked only to exercise restraint in the export of sensitive technology; the much more specific conditions laid out in the revised guidelines established objective criteria that had not been there before. The reference to the Additional Protocol as a condition of supply is a controversial new requirement because joining the Additional Protocol is entirely voluntary. Some countries balk at agreeing to the Additional Protocol because they feel strongly that as long as Article VI (the disarmament article) of the NPT is not being completely fulfilled by the nuclear weapon states, there is no justification for imposing further burdens and controls on the non-nuclear weapon states. The exemption made for the ABACC arrangement is also questionable; some think that the ABACC does not offer the same level of assurance regarding a country鈥檚 nuclear program that the Additional Protocol provides.
The revised guidelines are perceived as another burden on the non-nuclear weapon states. By comparison, if OPEC (the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries), for example, imposed guidelines that required purchasing countries to contribute 1 percent of their GDP for, say, Millennium Development Goals, the move would anger oil-purchasing nations. Arguably, exports of nuclear weapon components are different because they are weapons of mass destruction; but under the Wassenaar Arrangement and the Missile Technology Control Regime, developing countries are subject to the same level of controls if they wish to acquire conventional weapons.
The arrangements do not appear to be mutually cooperative. If the new guidelines were a result of consultation between the importing countries and the exporting countries, some consensus could have been reached. But because the importing countries were not consulted, the guidelines appear to be an additional limitation on these countries鈥 development.
In India, the situation is completely different. For one, the problem stems from the controversial U.S.-India Nuclear Cooperation Agreement, which was widely viewed, including by nonaligned countries that have friendly relations with India, as a violation of the NPT and as inconsistent with UN Security Council Resolution 1172, which contains very harsh language with regard to both India and Pakistan on the 1998 explosion of nuclear devices. The fact that India, which is outside the NPT, was embraced and given the facilities normally reserved for countries that are in good standing in the NPT as non-nuclear weapon states was considered a complete reversal of policy and a betrayal of the NPT. Aggressive U.S. diplomacy persuaded the NSG to accept the Nuclear Cooperation Agreement and waive the guidelines, making it a clean exemption, although the question of ENR was not specifically referred to at that time.
India now feels that it is not accountable to the June 2011 guidelines, and whether the guidelines apply to India has now become a significant and unresolved controversy. A number of experts who have read the U.S. legislation on the subject, including the Hyde Act, believe that India certainly will not receive permission for ENR technology. But comments from the Indian press and the external affairs minister, among others, make it clear that India understands the agreement to preclude restrictions on ENR technology in India. So that issue remains undecided.
Questions from the Audience
Question
There is an opportunity cost associated with shutting down base-load nuclear power plants in Germany: namely, that coal plants could have been shut down with the same effect on electricity generation and the same need to provide replacement power. An extensive study performed in Europe looked at the local consequences in terms of public health and environmental and external costs. For Germany, the study showed that the external costs associated with coal plants are much larger than for nuclear plants. What is the basis behind the decision to forgo the opportunity to shut down coal plants and to close nuclear plants instead?
Harald M眉ller
The decision was made on political grounds by a panicky government. There were no studies conducted or opportunity costs calculated. With the decision made, our engineers and economists will try to make the best of it. We have shut down six older nuclear power plants, and you can make the case that because of insufficient safety features, this was not by nature a wrong decision. We had an overhanging base-load capacity, and we secretly buy a small amount of nuclear electricity from our French friends to make up for the loss (though that is a temporary measure). There are plans to to meet our Kyoto goals by phasing out oil and coal from our home heating supply, and those efforts have been rapidly progressing. If you drive through any lower Franconian village, you will see about half the houses plastered with solar cells, and that is impressive. I think that our neighbors to the east will suffer from marginally higher electricity prices in the short term because we demand some imports, but that effect will not last. It was good to have some nuclear energy for the base load, but Germany typically completes the big industrial projects it takes on. I think that we will face some difficulties, but only temporarily.
Question
Would it be possible to negotiate a convention on export control to replace the NSG, thereby addressing the perception that the NSG is a cartel while still achieving control of sensitive technology and mitigating the risk that it could spread outside legitimate ends?
Jayantha Dhanapala
I think that an attempt to negotiate such an agreement would be seen as a good faith effort to bridge the current gap between the exporters and the importers. If such an agreement made clear that dual-use technologies require an additional set of precautions to be taken, as the Additional Protocol does with IAEA safeguards, then I think the developing countries would feel that they are participating in a multilateral effort, one that has nonproliferation as its objective but also does not act as a brake on their development. If cooperative arrangements such as ABACC are now being exempted, regional arrangements, for example, within ASEAN, could also be taken into account within the nuclear-weapon-free zones that mainly exist in developing countries. Then an agreement could be built on multilateral consensus rather than an arbitrary North/South divide.
Question
The Additional Protocol was adopted by consensus by the membership of the IAEA some years ago. It was negotiated in response to revelations that the IAEA did not have the capacity to regulate all exports. The IAEA has said that it needs the Additional Protocol in order to carry out its mission. Rather than the North, or the United States, or any other nation imposing controls, it is the IAEA saying, we need this tool in order to carry out our vital safeguards mission. Why is this seen as such a terrible thing in light of sensitive technologies?
Jayantha Dhanapala
When the IAEA adopted the Additional Protocol after a long process of negotiation, signing it was voluntary. It was never made mandatory, and that is the spirit in which it was accepted. In fact, a large number of nonaligned countries signed the Additional Protocol. As a voluntary measure, it entailed cooperation. But a mandatory requirement to have the Additional Protocol signed as a condition for importing certain technologies raises questions about the NPT鈥檚 asymmetrical allocation of obligations. The nuclear weapon states get off scot-free, while the non-nuclear weapon states are subjected to safeguards under Article III, based on the likelihood of diverting peaceful uses of nuclear energy to nonpeaceful uses. And yet Article IV states that the peaceful uses of nuclear energy are an inalienable right. There is a fundamental contradiction, and unless there is further progress in the realization of Article VI (which has been, in the view of developing countries, underlined by the International Court of Justice advisory opinion), the asymmetry of the treaty cannot be further extended. The voluntary nature of the agreement will continue to be the primary aspect of the Additional Protocol that the nonaligned countries would like to see preserved.
Question
What is the U.S. position, in the context of the NSG, on India and exemption from the new guidelines?
Jayantha Dhanapala
During his visit to India last year, President Obama said he would support India鈥檚 joining the NSG. But my impression is that the United States has not committed itself to a position on whether the June guidelines will be specifically applicable to India. The issue has been kept very vague. In India, officials have repeatedly remarked that they believe the clean exemption also exempted them from any restrictions on the ENR technology issue.
漏 2012 by Scott D. Sagan, Harald M眉ller, Noramly bin Muslim, Olli Heinonen, and Jayantha Dhanapala, respectively
To view or listen to the presentations, visit /content/events/events.aspx?d=488.