India offers new proposal in US nuclear talks
Afp, New Delhi
India has proposed to set up a special unit to reprocess spent atomic fuel under international safeguards in a bid to close a major civilian nuclear deal with Washington, a report said Friday. The proposal was put forth by Indian officials in a meeting with their American counterparts in Germany on the sidelines of the Group of Eight summit, the Press Trust of India news agency reported. It could end the impasse in talks to conclude the India-US nuclear agreement that aims to give New Delhi access to previously forbidden atomic technology to generate power for its booming economy, the report said. Separately, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh held talks with US President George W. Bush also in Heiligendamm, Singh's spokesman Sanjaya Baru said. "The conversation was positive," he said after the talks. India and the United States have been discussing the fine print of the energy accord that intends to reverse three decades of US sanctions on nuclear trade with India, even though New Delhi has not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and tested nuclear weapons in 1998.
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