N-deal: US govt urged to make responses public

With uncertainty persisting in India on the civilian nuclear initiative, leading critics of the proposal in the US are calling on the Bush administration to make public its responses to Congressional questions aimed at sorting out "ambiguous and contradictory" statements about the deal.

Two former senior non-proliferation officials, Fred McGoldrick and Henry Sokolski, joined Arms Control Association Executive Director Daryl G Kimball and Carnegie Endowment for International Peace Senior Associate Sharon Squassoni in calling upon the State Department to drop a virtual "gag" order on its unclassified responses to a detailed set of over 40 questions about the pending US-India nuclear trade deal sent in October by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.

"The administration's responses should be made publicly available so that US and Indian lawmakers and the public can evaluate whether the draft US-Indian accord conforms to the terms and conditions established by Congress," Kimball said in a media statement.

"The administration's unwillingness to make their answers more widely available suggests they have something to hide from either US or Indian legislators," he added.

According to Kimball, the key questions the committee asked the State Department to answer included: Will the US government terminate nuclear trade with India if it resumes testing? And whether the US intends to transfer sensitive nuclear technology through the agreement, or outside the pact that can be used to make nuclear weapons material.