Australia Remains Undecided on Exempting India From International Nuclear Trade Guidelines

New Australian leaders have not decided whether they would oppose a change to international nuclear trade rules sought by the United States and India, the Economic Times reported today (see GSN, Jan. 15).

Washington and New Delhi are seeking a bilateral trade agreement but need to clear some key traditional nonproliferation hurdles before they can advance the deal.  India needs to reach an agreement with the International Atomic Energy Agency to allow oversight of the nation’s civilian nuclear activities, and the 45-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group must agree to exempt New Delhi from guidelines that ban key nuclear sales to countries that do not belong the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty or do not allow inspectors of all their nuclear facilities.

Australia’s previous government had announced that it would reverse Canberra’s ban on nuclear trade with non-NPT nations (see GSN, Aug. 14, 2007), but the newly elected Labor government renounced that decision this week.

“It's a long-standing commitment of the Australian Labor Party that we don't authorize the export of uranium to countries who are not parties to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty,” said Foreign Minister Stephen Smith.  

Whether Australia would extend that view and oppose changes to NSG guidelines remains undecided, said Trade Minister Simon Crean.

“That’s a consideration we will make at the appropriate time,” he told the Economic Times, adding that Australia would wait for India to complete its IAEA inspections deal.  “We understand the importance of this agreement” (Nirmala Ganapathy, Economic Times, Jan. 18).

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