THE endgame in the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) negotiations at the Conference on Disarmament (CD) in Geneva has begun. Left with no choice, India has threatened to take the only step possible in the circumstances—to block a consensus on the treaty. And this has effectively pitted India against other nuclear weapon powers.
India has come a long way from the time it co-sponsored a resolution with the US and others in the United Nations in 1993 and 1994, mandating the CD to negotiate the CTBT. Today, it stands alone and has told the world that the draft treaty is not acceptable. It can be argued that if India had not co-sponsored the UN resolution with the US in 1993, things may not have come to such a pass where India's nuclear programme could be brought under international scrutiny, exposing the ambiguous nature of its nuclear option. India will have to be much more careful when the Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty negotiations begin.
Defence analyst Raja Mohan, who backs blocking a consensus in Geneva and India going nuclear, argues that India should use the treaty as an opportunity: "We can carry out a few tests and then join the treaty the way the French and the Chinese have done. We must extract something from the treaty. We must take a decision on our nuclear posture instead of only talking in normative terms about it." He feels there is no clarity on India's nuclear programme, otherwise negotiations on CTBT would have been much simpler.
On June 20, India had formally announced its opposition to the treaty and its decision to stay out of it. Then on July 29, Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) officials disclosed that India would be forced to block the treaty if the entry into force provision of the draft CTBT was not amended.
Foreign Secretary Salman Haider had said on June 20 that since the proposed CTBT did not address India's concerns on complete and time-bound nuclear disarmament, India, for reasons of national security, would stay out of it. But the Ramaker draft of CTBT, named after the current Dutch CD chairman, Jaap Ramaker, presented on June 28, had a clause which made it mandatory for India to be a party to the treaty for it to come into force. The clause also says that in case the treaty does not come into force in three years, the CD "shall consider and decide by consensus what measures consistent with international law may be undertaken to accelerate the ratification process in order to facilitate the early entry into force of this treaty".
Having concentrated its fire on the lack of a time-bound commitment to nuclear disarmament, New Delhi realises that this clause can expose it to punitive measures by the international community. Therefore, the day Indian officials briefed the media in New Delhi, Indian ambassador to the CD Arundhati Ghose made a tough and revealing statement at the CD. She said India had been "clearly and repeatedly told that our concerns will not be taken on board". Describing the entry into force clause as "obnoxious", she said this was "unprecendented in treaty negotiating practice. Which country present here would accept a situation where, after it has declared its dissatisfaction and, therefore, its decision not to sign, much less ratify, a particular treaty, finds that it is to be forced by other countries which accept the treaty to sign and ratify it despite it being against national interest or else face 'unspec-ified measures'? What measures do those countries who have drafted this obnoxious text envisage? What measures would be acceptable to any one of the countries in this room to force it to sign a treaty it has declared it will not sign?" If this clause was not modified, she said: "I would be reluctantly obliged to object to this text being forwarded to the plenary for consideration." She offered an amendment to this clause which would keep India out.
Within days of this, US Secretary of State Warren Christopher attacked India for threatening to hold up the treaty. Appearing before the House of Representatives International Relations Committee, he said Washington was determined to send the draft CTBT text to the United Nations General Assembly to be opened for signatures in September.
This is the crux of the matter. When India says it will block the treaty, can it prevent it from being sent to the General Assembly directly and then being opened for signatures? Tentatively, the answer is no. It will be a mistake to underestimate the US resolve to clinch the treaty. What Christopher has openly said, Americans privately admit: "It's a window of opportunity and we don't want this one chance to slip away."
Indians are coming alive to this possibility too. As External Affairs Minister I.K.Gujral told the Rajya Sabha on August 2, it was "unprecedented" that some western countries were trying to bypass the CD and take the CTBT straight to the UN. However, Indian analysts argue that a treaty which skirts India's objections will not have the same political force and legitimacy as the one with India in it.
It is indeed unprecedented in international negotiations that a country is being forced to sign a treaty. Says C. Uday Bhaskar, senior fellow at the Institute for Defence Studies and Analyses: "We are getting into fairly uncharted waters because never in the post-World War II history of international negotiations, have we seen such a situation. There has never been such an entry into force clause. The West seems to be saying heads I win, tails you lose. We have to stand up now and show our spine."
Till the July 29 briefing, Gujral and other MEA officials had maintained that India would stay out of the treaty. India hoped to find some way of staying out of the CTBT, as it did in the case of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). But Gujral and the South Block officials knew better. And Ghose's statement said it best. The Indian statement can be seen as a tactical move though it may eventually end up blocking the treaty.
IN American suggestion for India not to block the treaty is that it should put down its protest along with the treaty.
But this begs a question. What happens after three years when the treaty is supposed to come into force? Even then India could be coerced to get on board by threat of international sanctions. Some Americans feel that India need not interpret this clause in a negative manner. "We will not pressurise India. There is a certain logic in our relations with India." They say the CTBT adds nothing to the ability of other nations to take punitive actions against some country. There are enough laws which can be used to impose sanctions against a country.
Expressing surprise at the "extraordinary change" in India's stand on the CTBT over the last one year, they argue that India does not need to conduct any tests and that the CTBT will not affect the existing nuclear programme (an argument dismissed by Indians). New Delhi, they say, can have no leverage by refusing to sign the treaty. Christopher's statement is clear that the US is determined to get the treaty through with or without India.
The hardening of India's stand and Christopher's equally tough response is bound to have repurcussions on Indo-US
relations. Says Raja Mohan: "India will have to incur some loss for blocking a consensus. But in the interest of national security, we should be prepared for that." As he said at a recent seminar: "Standing up and getting kicked in the shin is better than lying down and getting kicked in the face." However, he warns that "if we block the treaty and still remain ambiguous about our nuclear option, we would gain nothing".
As things stand today, India is not the only country standing between the world and the test ban treaty. China has objections to the verification regime though it is vehemently opposed to India getting a waiver from signing the treaty. It demonstrated its contempt for the CD negotiations when it conducted a nuclear test on the first day the CD reassembled on July 29. This is reminiscent of its test last year, which was conducted two days after the NPT was extended indefinitely.
The signals emanating from Pakistan are equally confusing. While the government says it will sign the CTBT if India does, army chief, Gen. Jahangir Karamat, has gone on record saying that even if India signs the treaty Pakistan will decide independently whether to do so or not.
But regardless of what others do, as Ghose told the CD, even if the entry into force clause is modified getting "India's signature may be desirable but it's not attainable".
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