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US denies change in non-proliferation moves in south Asia

The Clinton administration has ruled out any change in the United States's non-proliferation objectives in south Asia, where both India and Pakistan have demonstrated their capacity to build nuclear weapons by resorting to tests in May last.

''We have made it clear that we have very clear and important objectives that we have laid out for some time. We believe that it is extremely important to protect not only the non-proliferation regimes, but also the world from the danger of an arms competition between India and Pakistan,'' state department spokesman James Rubin said yesterday.

Replying to questions during his daily press briefing, he spelt out the US objectives and said, ''They have not changed.''

''We have called for the signature and ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, a restraint regime covering nuclear weapons and their means of delivery, an export control system, a moratorium on the production of fissile material, pending negotiation of a treaty banning the production of such material, and, obviously, the importance of direct talks between India and Pakistan on the issues between them. Those are our objectives, they have not changed,'' he added.

Rubin said, ''We have always said that we are prepared to use our tools in a discriminating and flexible way to achieve those objectives. To the extent that we can achieve progress towards those goals, we want, of course, to encourage that through incentives and disincentives.''

''That's always been our policy, nothing has changed. I think, if anything, our determination to continue to try to achieve these goals has been shown with each additional mission by deputy secretary (Strobe) Talbott to that end,'' he added.

Talbott leads the US side in the non-proliferation dialogue with India and Pakistan, which began shortly after their May nuclear tests. Minister for External Affairs Jaswant Singh represents India. Talbott's Pakistani interlocutor is the country's foreign secretary Shamshad Ahmed.

Currently, the US side is having the 8th round of the talks with the two countries. Talbott, after visiting India, is currently in Pakistan having discussions with its officials on nuclear and related security issues.

Asked to highlight the ''concrete progress'' made by the Talbott mission to New Delhi Rubin said, ''We believe that concrete progress was made, in particular with respect to the signing of the CTBT and the timing of that signing. We have some important movement on that."

Then turning to the correspondent who asked the question, he said, ''You can shake your head and frown but that's a fact.''

When asked whether the Pakistanis had also given Talbott ''a similar, more concrete promises as to when they will sign the CTBT'', Rubin, in reply, said, ''I'm not aware of that.

Asked whether they talked about ''Kashmir, and if so, is there anything you can report,'' the spokesman said, ''I don't think there was much movement on that.''

In reply to a question about the Taliban's role, Rubin said, ''The Taliban is a separate bilateral issue between the United States and Pakistan. Deputy Secretary Talbott's mission was focused on the India-Pakistan angle. We have many different ways in which we can raise the bilateral issues between us and Pakistan and we will do so.''

UNI

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