Congressional Statements

Pallone speaks out against India's inclusion in Nuclear Nonproliferation Provision of State Department Authorization Bill

Press Release
September 26, 2002

U.S. Rep. Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), founder of the Congressional Caucus on India and Indian Americans, spoke out yesterday on the floor of the U.S. House of Representatives against a provision included in the State Department Authorization Conference Report that included India with Pakistan as countries that need to meet certain nuclear and missile non-proliferation benchmarks by September 30, 2003.

The State Department Authorization Conference Agreement includes Section 1601 that was originally adopted by the Senate as part of the Security Assistance Act of 2001. The original House version of the State Department Authorization bill contained no such provision, but the Senate language was approved when the two chambers met in Conference to reconcile differences between two separate bills passed in each chamber.

Section 1601 requires the President to submit a report to Congress not later than March 1, 2003, on U.S. efforts to pursue with the Governments of India and Pakistan a series of Non-proliferation benchmarks and the likelihood of their being achieved by September 30, 2003.

Pallone said that Section 1601, as it relates to India, resurrects "benchmarks" borne out of the May 1998 nuclear tests by India and Pakistan. In the more than four years since then, U.S.-India relations have moved far beyond these "benchmarks." The intense level of engagement between the U.S. and India on security and strategic issues has enhanced the mutual understanding of each country's concerns in this area.

"This provision in the Conference Report - though it may indeed have been drafted with the best of intention - is essentially unnecessary and based on an outdated approach to dealing with mutual nuclear nonproliferation concerns of the U.S. and India," Pallone said. "The provision does not contribute to the ongoing positive and substantive progress in U.S.-India relations, and may actually detract from that progress."

"For its part, India has already taken the lead in adopting policies that address most of the nonproliferation issues raised in Section 1601, including a moratorium on further nuclear testing, a 'no first use' commitment against nuclear weapons states, and a policy of nonuse against non-nuclear weapons states," Pallone continued.

Pallone said that India also has adopted a wide range of other confidence-building measures, including clarification that its nuclear program is defensive in nature, confined to building a minimum credible deterrent and the establishment of a nuclear command and control system under its elected political leadership.