China's Nuclear Exports and Assistance to South Asia

China's Nuclear Exports and Assistance to South Asia

The May 1998 nuclear tests in South Asia focused international attention on China's role in the the development of nuclear weapons in South Asia. Although China has had some nuclear trade and cooperation with India, China's more significant nuclear relationship in South Asia is with Pakistan. Indeed, China's nuclear trade with Pakistan has caused as much or more concern than China's nuclear trade with any other country. Past reports of China supplying entire bomb designs and conducting a test of a Pakistani nuclear device at China's Lop Nur testing range have created substantial controversy in the United States. In 1996, Washington came close to imposing sanctions on China for the sale of ring magnets to an unsafeguarded Pakistani nuclear laboratory. Sanctions were only averted by China's 11 May 1996 pledge not to provide assistance to unsafeguarded nuclear facilities, a reaffirmation of its nonproliferation pledges, and a specific clarification that these pledges would preclude the future transfer of ring magnets. China has also assisted Pakistan in the construction of a 40 MW reactor at Khushab that US officials feared could provide Pakistan with plutonium for its weapons program and with a nuclear reactor at the Chashma Nuclear Power Plant.

China insists that all of it nuclear cooperation, including that with Pakistan, is strictly for peaceful purposes. On 10 April 1999, Chinese National People's Congress (NPC) Chair, Li Peng, while on a visit to Pakistan told reporters that "the nuclear devices Pakistan exploded were the results of Pakistan's own scientific research, and our cooperation in the nuclear field with Pakistan is limited to the peaceful use of nuclear energy." ["China/Pakistan: No weapons aid", Nucleonics Week, 15 April 1999] Despite this, the US remains skeptical of these assurances. A February 2000 CIA report entitled "Unclassified Report to Congress on the Acquisition of Technology Relating to Weapons of Mass Destruction and Advanced Conventional Munitions, 1 January Through 30 June 1999," stated, "China, which has provided extensive support in the past to Islamabad's WMD programs, in May 1996 promised to stop assistance to unsafeguarded nuclear facilities -- but we cannot rule out ongoing contacts." Concerns persist in the US as to China's nuclear assistance to Pakistan. The January 2001 Defense Department report, Proliferation Threat and Response, suggests Beijing's behavior is driven in part by strategic interests in the region and domestic economic pressure.

For additional in-depth information on open-source reports of Chinese exports and assistance, please consult the CNS Nuclear Abstracts database.

CHINA'S NUCLEAR EXPORTS AND ASSISTANCE TO SOUTH ASIA

COUNTRY

REPORTED AREA OF CHINESE NUCLEAR ASSISTANCE

INDIA

Heavy water (D2O):

--130-150 metric tons (1982-1987) (supplied without safeguards)

Low-enriched uranium (LEU) (1995):

--For India's Tarapur BWRs (supplied under IAEA safeguards)

Uranium enrichment services:

--For India's Tarapur BWRs (supplied under IAEA safeguards)

PAKISTAN

(Map of Chinese Nuclear and Missile Assistance)

NUCLEAR WEAPON-RELATED ASSISTANCE

Nuclear weapon design (Possibly Chic-4 design provided in 1980s)
Nuclear weapon testing (inclusion of Pakistani observers in Chinese test at Lop Nur) (1989)Tritium gas (1986) (supplied without safeguards)
Uranium enrichment (assistance to unsafeguarded Kahuta enrichment facility)
Weapons-grade uranium for two devices (1980s) (supplied without safeguards)

DUAL-USE NUCLEAR ASSISTANCE

Power Reactors: Chashma-1 (CHASNUPP-1):

--Commissioned on 24 November 1999

--supplied under IAEA safeguards--INFCIRC/418

--power plant computer system for Chashma-1

Reprocessing Facility at Chashma (unsafeguarded)

--Possible assistance with construction

Research reactors:

--Miniature Neutron Source Reactor (MNSR) (supplied under IAEA safeguards--INFCIRC/393) (1991)

--Parr-1 (unsafeguarded)

--Parr-2 (the China Institute of Atomic Energy [CIAE] designed the reactor's nuclear system)

Ring magnets (about 5,000) (to unsafeguarded A.Q. Khan Research Laboratory in Kahuta) (1995) (supplied without safeguards)
Plutonium Production reactor at Khushab, 50-70 MW Heavy Water Reactor (unsafeguarded)

-- Chinese assistance with construction

-- Provision of special industrial furnace and high-tech diagnostic equipment in September 1996

Heavy water (D2O):

--Up to 5 MT/year for safeguarded PHWR [Kanupp] research reactor

--Possibly diverted by Pakistan to the Khushab research reactor against Chinese wishes

Fuel fabrication services

[CHINA'S NUCLEAR EXPORTS AND ASSISTANCE TO PAKISTAN]

[CHINA'S NUCLEAR EXPORTS]

[CHINA'S MISSILE EXPORTS AND ASSISTANCE TO SOUTH ASIA]

[CHINA AND THE NUCLEAR TESTS IN SOUTH ASIA]

This material is produced independently for NTI by the James Martin Center for Nonproliferation Studies at the Monterey Institute of International Studies and does not necessarily reflect the opinions of and has not been independently verified by NTI or its directors, officers, employees, agents. Copyright © 2007 by MIIS.