With growing concerns on the new guidelines of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG),India will engage the US for transfer of sensitive technologies to enable full civilian cooperation when US Secretary of state Hillary Clinton comes to New Delhi for the strategic dialogue meeting on July 19. Clinton will meet External Affairs Minister S M Krishna for the strategic dialogue,said the Ministry of External Affairs. This will be the first dialogue after President Barack Obamas landmark visit to India in November 2010,when the US announced the easing of dual-use trade and declared support for Indias full membership of elite nuclear clubs like the NSG. However,the recent NSG guidelines at its plenary meeting in the Netherlands last month,which tightens export of enrichment and reprocessing (ENR) technologies to countries that have not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty,has got India worried. The US has assured that the new guidelines will not impact the clean waiver granted by the 46-nation nuclear group to India in September 2008. However,Krishna will seek a reassurance on this point when he meets Clinton,officials said. The access to ENR technologies was a key part of the historic India-US civil nuclear agreement signed in 2008 to resume full civilian nuclear cooperation between the two nations. The issue will also figure in the eighth meeting of the India-US High Technology Group on Monday. Foreign secretary Nirupama Rao will meet Eric I. Hirschhorn,the Under Secretary of Industry and Security,and review the progress in the dismantling of barriers blocking high-tech exports to India.
