The United States on Monday asked the members of the Nuclear Suppliers Group to consider and support India's application to join the grouping during their plenary meeting in Seoul beginning on Tuesday.
A lowdown on why NSG membership is important for India
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"Bilateral talks usually focus on a broad range of issues: from the crucial international problems, such as Iraq, Afghanistan, and response to international terrorism, to the coordination of the working issues of bilateral cooperation."
Aziz said Pakistan is committed not to transfer nuclear weapons to other states or assist others to acquire nuclear weapons and consistently supported the goal of a nuclear-weapons-free world.
Against the backdrop of Beijing's negative role at the Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting in Vienna, Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jeichi on Monday met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and held talks with External Affairs Minister Pranab Mukherjee. Dr Singh told Yang that India was pleased to get the NSG waiver last week, official sources said.
The draft of the proposal for the India-specific exemption at the Nuclear Suppliers Group has undergone further changes which include a provision for regular information by its head about New Delhi's adherence to its guidelines on global atomic trade, a move aimed at pacifying countries having reservations over the waiver to India.
Ahead of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif's visit to United States in October, the United States is negotiating a pact on the new limits on Pakistan's nuclear weapons and delivery systems, a deal which might lead to an agreement that is similar to the Indo-US civil nuclear deal, according to a media report.
'Procedural procrastination' was Chinese strategy to delay India waiver, NSG diplomats say
'India must be the very first large State in history that has consciously and voluntarily decided to dismantle itself.'
Terming the waiver granted to India by the 45-member Nuclear Suppliers group as a 'huge step' in the relationship between the United States and India, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has complimented the role played by the Indian government in Vienna.In comments made to the traveling press in Algiers on Saturday, Rice said India showed a lot of leadership skills in Vienna, where everybody took everyone else's concerns seriously and found the ways to bridge it.
Buoyed by the International Atomic Energy Agency's approval of the India-specific safeguards pact, the US on Sunday vowed to push through expeditiously the Nuclear Suppliers Group process but said New Delhi would have to answer a lot of questions to secure a waiver from the 45-nation bloc when it meets later this month.
The challenge before the Congress is to get its arithmetic right and mount an operation that is foolproof, particularly after the way things were botched up in Srinagar
Making nuclear exemptions for India, says Senator Edward Markey, 'only infuriates Pakistan and leads them to further increase their own nuclear capacities.'
Norway on Thursday offered its expertise and cooperation to help India meet its energy needs even as its Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said
China on Monday claimed it did nothing to block the waiver for India at the Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting in Vienna and that it played a "positive" and "constructive" role. "The Chinese side adopted a responsible and positive attitude with regard to the discussion at NSG and now we see that a consensus was reached," Chinese Foreign Minister Yang Jiechi told CNN-IBN.
India's entry into the Wassenaar Arrangement would enhance its credentials in the field of non-proliferation despite not being a signatory to the Non-Proliferation Treaty.
"Hello Hangzhou! PM lands in China to attend the G20 Summit," Modi tweeted.
"This Friday in Vienna a plenary session of the NSG will be held. Our position is subject to no change as of date," China said.
The PM also welcomed South Korea's efforts to maintain peace and stability of the Korean Peninsula.
This will be the fifth time that a French leader will be a chief guest at India's Republic Day celebrations -- the maximum number from any country so far.
"This is something we will keep working on together. We strongly support India's accession in the NSG," he said.
The outgoing Obama Administration has hit out at China for blocking India's entry into the elite NSG by describing the communist giant an "outlier".
The next plenary session of the Nuclear Suppliers Group is likely to be held in Swiss capital Bern next month.
With the spectre of nuclear terrorism growing, the international community is concerned about the security of India's nuclear facilities. The worry has grown since 2010, when radioactive Cobalt-60 surfaced in a New Delhi scrapyard, killing one person and hospitalising eight others.
Joining in the opposition's criticism of Prime Minister Narendra Modi after India failed in its bid to clinch Nuclear Suppliers Group membership, Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi on Friday took a dig at the PM calling it a "failed diplomacy".
The United States is committed to ensuring India's entry into the Nuclear Suppliers Group, a top American diplomat said on Wednesday, expressing "regret" that his government was unsuccessful in making it a member of the grouping at its pleanary in Seoul last week.
Preceding the two-day plenary of the 48-member NSG, which began on Thursday, China had repeatedly said that India's membership was not on the agenda and is said to have made every effort to prevent any discussion on India's bid.
Even as Pakistan continues to urge the international community to accept its membership to the Nuclear Suppliers Group, highly placed sources in the United States who are involved with the tracking of nuclear commerce have claimed that Islamabad is still selling nuclear materials to North Korea.
China on Monday said differences remain among members of the Nuclear Suppliers Group over the inclusion of new countries and the issue was not even on the agenda of the grouping's meeting in Seoul this week, a day after External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj asserted that Beijing was not opposing India's entry
On the eve of the crucial Nuclear Suppliers Group meeting in Seoul over India and Pakistan's membership in the elite group, Pakistan's former permanent representative at the United Nations in Geneva Zamir Akram has said that Islamabad was only opposed to the "exclusive membership" of India.
Leaders of the two countries, however, did discuss on Pakistan's nuclear safety and security which is an ongoing discussion.
'The onus is now on China to explain to the world why it feels Pakistan should accompany India on the question of NSG Membership!! China's not so covert help for Pakistan's nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programmes will stand exposed,' says former ambassador G Parthasarathy.
The proposal for undertaking joint technical development work for extending range beyond 300-km has been executed between India and Russia, Minister of State for Defence Subhash Bhamre said in a written reply to the Lok Sabha.
Signalling the continuity of policy, the new government has ratified the Additional Protocol, a commitment given under Indo-US nuclear deal by the previous dispensation to grant greater ease to International Atomic Energy Agency to monitor India's civilian atomic programme.
Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar said bilateral ties with China faced 'some challenges' in the recent past.
Informing the world leaders of measures taken by him, Modi said India will continue to accord a high national priority to nuclear security through strong institutional framework, independent regulatory agency and trained and specialised manpower.
Modi has made nuclear power a key element of his clean energy strategy
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