U.S., India sign unprecedented nuclear deal

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Asalaamu Alykum dear friends:

It's been a while since my last post.  Thank you for reading and sharing
with others.  Insha'Allah more of you will be less shy about sharing ideas
in this section.  Let's increase the communal bond.  I apologize for
the blue underline as I can't seem to delete it.  The news piece I'm sharing with you today is not a happy one despite
Condeleezza Rice's position.  Here's why I feel this way (the news is posted
below my views):

Since our economy here in the U.S can not afford to
continue in the nuclear industry, we are outsourcing dangerous jobs (a threat
to all lands & people) to places like India.  This is a shameful
decision on the part of the U.S. government. These jobs have cost people their
lives and the security and safety of the environment in the U.S.  We can
not continue to operate this way as a global community.  

The people of India would do well to start sending
their children abroad to study environmental science, alternative energy, green
building design, and become teachers in this field.  Otherwise they will
need every citizen of their great nation to become doctors to treat the
radiation sickness their citizens will be exposed to.  People of the
world: learn from our mistakes as we here in the U.S. are having a difficult
time cleaning our nuclear waste because of its radio active material.  We
can't bury it, send it to space, dump it in the ocean, because it takes a
million years for the uranium to be safe for disposal...so we're taking our
waste to countries in Africa and Afghanistan, where the government is too poor
to refuse the U.S. waste.  The worst part is that the labeling on the
barrels are illegally marked as "safe" and no one questions them.

Read up on the Chernobyl accident that happened in
Russia in the 80's.  Russia continues to lose their citizens to all sorts
of health problems from radiation fallout because their government lied to them
that nuclear power was safe.  Fight this tooth and nail.  The future
of your people and the world are depending on it!

May Allah Guide, Protect, and Bless us All.

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http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27122378/
U.S., India sign unprecedented nuclear deal

Rice hails accord as  'historic occasion'; critics fear arms race

  Secretary
of State Condoleezza Rice and Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee
exchange documents after signing a nuclear cooperation agreement during
a ceremony at the State Department on Friday.

Manuel Balce Ceneta / AP 

WASHINGTON - The United States and India
signed an accord Friday that allows American businesses to sell nuclear fuel,
technology and reactors to India, reversing a three-decade ban on atomic trade
with the fast-growing nuclear-armed Asian power.

The civilian nuclear cooperation
agreement, the result of three years of often frustrating political and
diplomatic wrangling, marks a major shift in U.S. policy toward India after
decades of mutual wariness. India has faced a nuclear trade ban since its first
atomic test in 1974 and has refused to sign nonproliferation accords.

"This is truly a historic
occasion," Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told a crowd gathered for
the signing ceremony in the State Department's ornate Benjamin Franklin Room.
"Many thought this day would never come, but doubts have been silenced
now."

The two countries "now stand as
equals, closer together than ever before," said Rice, with India's foreign
minister, Pranab Mukherjee, sitting by her side.

The Bush administration portrays the
accord as the cornerstone of a new strategic relationship with a friendly
democracy that borders China and Pakistan and that supporters hail as a
responsible nuclear power.

India's government hopes the deal will
bring a new source of desperately needed energy as it works to lift millions
out of poverty.

Mukherjee said his country looks forward
to working with American companies eager to enter India's multibillion-dollar
nuclear market. More access to nuclear power, he said, also will boost India's
industry and rural development and help every sector of the economy grow.

He called the accord a sign "of the
transformed relationship and partnership that our two countries are building
together."

Nuclear proliferation

Indian critics say the pact could cap the country's nuclear weapons program
and allow the United States to dictate Indian foreign policy.

Opponents in the United States say the
extra fuel the measure provides could boost India's nuclear weapons stockpile
by freeing up its domestic fuel for use in weapons. That, they say, could spark
a nuclear arms race in Asia, where neighboring Pakistan and China also have
atomic weapons.

U.S. lawmakers opposed to the plan have
said it ruins the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the global agreement that
provides civilian nuclear trade in exchange for a pledge from nations not to
pursue nuclear weapons and which India refuses to sign.

President Bush this week signed into law
the congressionally approved plan to start nuclear trade in exchange for
safeguards and U.N. inspections at India's civilian, but not military, nuclear
plants. The accord marks a rare foreign policy victory for Bush in his final
months in office.

Bush and Prime Minister Manmohan Singh
announced their intention to pursue nuclear cooperation in July 2005. U.S.
lawmakers overwhelmingly approved the deal in a conditional form in late 2006.
It then overcame strong political opposition in India, where critics threatened
to bring down Singh's government, denouncing the accord as a ploy to make India
Washington's pawn.

Edited by love - 19 October 2008 at 4:09am