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Pakistan tells U.S. it qualifies for nuclear suppliers club

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Reuters
Reuters
Reuters is an international news organisation owned by Thomson Reuters

Such a move would drag the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) into the long-running tension between Pakistan and India, nuclear-armed neighbours, who have fought three wars since being split amid violence at the end of British colonial rule in 1947.

Diplomats last year quietly launched a new push to induct India into the NSG – a 48-nation club dedicated to curbing nuclear arms proliferation by controlling the export and re-transfer of materials that could foster nuclear weapons development.

“Pakistan expressed confidence in its credentials to become full member of the export control regimes, particularly Nuclear Suppliers Group,” the Foreign Ministry’s official spokesman said in a tweet.

The comment followed talks on Tuesday in Islamabad between Pakistan Foreign Secretary Aizaz Chaudhry and U.S. Under Secretary of State for Arms Control Rose Gottemoeller.

The U.S. Embassy in Islamabad declined to comment.

Membership of the NSG would increase India’s international clout and provide a vested interest in curbing the world’s most dangerous regional arms race, but the prospects are fraught.

The campaign for India membership is seen as carrying the risk of antagonizing Pakistan as well as its ally China, which could veto any India application.

China could also insist as a condition of India’s membership that Pakistan also be allowed to join.

A further complication is that neither Pakistan nor India has signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, generally seen as a prerequisite to NSG membership.

The Nuclear Suppliers Group is expected to hold its next meeting in June.

The NSG was created in response to India’s testing its first nuclear weapon in 1974.

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