Clinton gives Pakistan a parting kick and China a goodbye gift

Clinton gives Pakistan a parting kick and China a goodbye gift
CHIDANAND RAJGHATTA

WASHINGTON, NOV 22: In its twilight days in office, the Clinton Administration on Tuesday waived sanctions against China for its missile transfers to Pakistan while imposing fresh but largely meaningless restrictions against Islamabad.

US officials said the administration's move followed fresh guarantees from China that it will not transfer any more missiles or technology to Pakistan and Iran that violates international norms. China has pledged as much in the past and not kept its promise.

However, Washington's magnanimity this time is aimed at allowing American entities to have commercial transactions with Chinese space agencies that canlaunch US satellites for a fraction of what it would cost in the West. Pakistan, which is already in possession of complete Chinese missiles transferred in the 1992-93 period, is an inconsequential bit player in this arrangement, having already stacked up the missiles it has received from Beijing.

In fact, as it cleared out of office, the Clinton Administration finally admitted to facts it has been obfuscating all these years that China had transferred full missile systems and technologies to Pakistan as India had been saying all along.

State Department Spokesman Richard Boucher acknowledged that some Chinese and Pakistani entities were involved in transfers of Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) Category I items -- that is, complete missiles, their major subsystems, or their production facilities. The US had never publicly confirmed this.

Boucher said China also helped Pakistan in MTCR Category II items, that is, components and materials used to make Category I missiles and subsystems.Moreover, all the entities involved knew they were in violation of agreements, he added.

Just how serious Chinese transgressions were with regard to Pakistan was evident in Boucher's disclosure of the China-Iran transfer. On a comparative scale, some Chinese entities and Iranian entities were only involved in transfers of MTCR Category II items to Iranian entities, Boucher revealed.

Despite this quantum difference, Cold War exponents in both the State Department and the Pentagon, who have treated Pakistan as a surrogate state and winked at its proliferation usually, made more noise about Chinese transfers to Iran. New Delhi complained often, and justifiably it now seems, that Washington was turning a blind eye to egregious proliferation in the sub-continent.

Even then, the sanctions issue would not have come up but for the fact that Congressionally mandated US law enjoins the administration every two years to either waive or impose restrictions against the entities involved in proliferation.

Boucher said in consideration of China's commitment not to assist the development of MTCR-class ballistic missiles in any way and to strengthen itsmissile-related export controls, the US is waiving the sanctions required against the Chinese entities. The administration, however, was imposing sanctions against the Iranian and Pakistani entities, he added.

The sanctioned entities in Pakistan are the Ministry of Defence and the Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission, and their sub-units and successors, Boucher said. The Iranian entities are the Defence Industries Organization, the Ministry of Defence and Armed Forces Logistics, and their sub-units and successors.

Boucher acknowledged though that the new sanctions will actually have very limited economic effect, but they do send a strong signal that the United States opposes these countries' missiles programs.

Both Pakistan and Iran are already under a variety of sanctions and the new restrictions do not further them in any way.

Boucher also said Washington is prepared to discuss with Pakistan the conditions under which a waiver on the Pakistani entities might be warranted, but there is also no basis for waiving the sanctions against Iranian entities.

Boucher said the US believed that the Indian Government would agree with our determination that Chinese entities have made missile-related transfers to Pakistan. ``We believe that India should welcome the comprehensive and explicit assurances that China has given that no such cooperation will take place in the future,'' he added.