Global Security Newswire

Elements of the Pakistani security establishment that give backing to extremist groups planning terrorist attacks on India risk sparking a nuclear conflict, a senior U.S. military officer told senators on Thursday (see GSN, Dec. 16, 2011).

Adm. Samuel Locklear said in prepared comments, "Support by elements of Pakistan's military and intelligence services for violent extremist organizations targeting India strains the relationship; this support has the potential to result in military confrontation which could rapidly escalate to a nuclear exchange," the Press Trust of India reported.

A four-year peace process between the nuclear-armed foes was brought to an abrupt halt in November 2008 when Lashkar-e-Taiba operatives based in Pakistan launched a series of coordinated attacks that killed more than 160 people in the Indian city of Mumbai. Some senior Indian officials have publicly accused Pakistan's powerful Inter-Services Intelligence agency of giving logistical aid to the attackers, a claim denied in Pakistan (see GSN, May 24, 2011).

Though the South Asian states last year renewed efforts to resolve longstanding disputes, the peace talks could again be imperiled if another large-scale terrorist assault is launched on India (see GSN, June 6, 2011).

"Current efforts at dialogue have yielded few concrete results on the core security issues, especially regarding the resolution of territorial disputes," Locklear said in written testimony to senators weighing his confirmation to lead the U.S. Pacific Command.

Still, the renewed dialogue has left both sides with more understanding of the thinking in the other nation, he said. "While progress is slow, the trajectory is positive and offers the promise of increased confidence-building measures (Lalit Jha, Press Trust of India/Oneindia.com, Feb. 9).

Meanwhile, Russia called on India and Pakistan as well as Israel to "guarantee" the security of their nuclear materials, equipment and infrastructure, Interfax reported on Thursday.

Israel, like India and Pakistan, has refused to sign the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. However, it refrains from affirming or denying widely held views that it possesses nuclear weapons.

"Along with NPT member states, we have spoken many times in favor of Pakistan along with India and Israel joining the treaty as non-nuclear states. Unfortunately, presently that is unrealistic," Russian Foreign Ministry Security and Disarmament Department Director Mikhail Ulyanov said. "But we expect that at least these countries will guarantee effective resistance to illegal turnover of nuclear materials and technologies, the reliable safety of their nuclear materials and the improvement of the physical security of their nuclear facilities."

The three countries recently received poor scores on their overall nuclear security conditions in a comprehensive analysis commissioned by the Washington-based Nuclear Threat Initiative. Pakistan was given a particularly low rating, ranking next to last -- just above North Korea -- among the 32 nations possessing a threshold level of weapon-usable nuclear materials (see GSN, Jan. 12).

"I'd like to stress that the challenge of preventing the falling of sensitive technologies and materials into the wrong hands concerns not only Pakistan," Ulyanov said. "It is of a global nature and requires efforts of all countries and the international community on the whole" (Interfax, Feb. 9).

[Editor's Note: The Nuclear Threat Initiative is the sole sponsor of Global Security Newswire, which is published independently by the National Journal Group.]