Global Security Newswire

The Obama administration said it would urge India to consider "changes" to its new nuclear liability bill, which is needed to implement the far-reaching 2008 U.S.-Indian atomic trade agreement, the Press Trust of India reported today (see GSN, Sept. 7).

In the form passed by India's Parliament, the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Bill caps nuclear reactor operator liability following an atomic disaster at about $320 million and permits lawsuits against suppliers of nuclear materials, technology and services -- something that goes against international norms.

Indian business groups have criticized the legislation as being too harsh and warn it would deter foreign nuclear firms from doing business with the nation's growing atomic power sector.

"We continue our discussions with the Indian government on this issue and we note that Indian business leaders are concerned about some specific aspects of the law that was just passed by Parliament," State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley said. "We will look to the Indian government to see what changes can be made," he added.

The bill narrowly passed Parliament's upper house on Aug. 30. The coalition government maintains the measure has the same allowances for victim compensation as those in the United States and said it remained amenable to incorporating some suggestions.

U.S. officials and industry groups were surprised the bill made it through Parliament "despite retaining language inconsistent with international standards for engaging in nuclear commerce," Heritage Foundation South Asia specialist Lisa Curtis said.

"This latest obstacle in the U.S.-India nuclear deal is unfortunate, as it follows the successful completion of a U.S.-India nuclear reprocessing agreement earlier this year, which granted India the right to reprocess spent nuclear fuel," Curtis said (Press Trust of India/Hindu, Sept. 8).

U.S. Ambassador to India Timothy Roemer met with Indian national security adviser Shiv Shankar Menon to discuss U.S. reservations with the bill, according to India Today (India Today, Sept. 8).

The U.S.-Indian cooperation pact ended decades of international atomic isolation imposed on the South Asian nation over its development of nuclear weapons outside the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty. It also opened the door to other atomic trade deals with Nuclear Suppliers Group nations like France and Russia.

The U.S.-India Business Council, which is composed of hundreds of leading U.S. firms with dealings in India, called on New Delhi to adopt nuclear liability rules "channeling absolute and exclusive liability to nuclear power plant operators and establishing a sole remedy for compensation of claims," RTT News reported.

"These principles are basic to international best practices as reflected in the International Atomic Energy Agency's Convention on Supplementary Compensation," the lobby group said following the bill's passage (RTT News, Sept. 8).

India's main opposition party, Bharatiya Janata, which backed the bill after the Congress party-led coalition government agreed to the harsher strictures, said today it was opposed to any secret "changes" to the measure, Daily News & Analysis reported.

"It is a law passed by Parliament. Parliament is supreme. The government cannot suddenly change anything surreptitiously without coming before Parliament," BJP spokesperson Prakash Javdekar said to journalists (Daily News & Analysis, Sept. 8).