US senators give July deadline for N-deal

[gateley]

BS Reporter / New Delhi February 21, 2008

In between acting as observers for elections in Pakistan and surveying the grim situation in war-torn Afghanistan, a group of US senators today made an unscheduled stopover at New Delhi to make a last ditch effort to salvage the Indo-US civil nuclear deal that, right now, is stuck due to opposition by the Left parties.

Two Democrat senators John Kerry and Joseph Biden and Chuck Hagel from the ruling Republican party met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and told him that the deal was as good as dead unless it was operationalised by July. (snip)

Later Kerry, Biden and Hagel also met National Security Advisor M K Narayanan and had a luncheon meeting with a group of Members of Parliament, whose names they did not disclose. They said the main discussion with the Indians was about the nuclear deal, besides the situation in Pakistan.

Sources said theirs was unscheduled visit as the Senators had primarily come to monitor the elections in Pakistan and were scheduled to fly to Kabul to oversee the situation in the country.

“We did not want to leave India out in out visit,’’ Kerry said. The US senators flew in this morning and had left by afternoon for Kabul.

Biden and his colleagues mainly told the Indian leaders that the blocking of the deal was embarrassment for all those who had overwhelmingly supported the deal. (snip)

http://www.business-standard.com/common/news_article.php?leftnm=10&bKeyFlag=BO&autono=314534

[yankeeinlouisiana]

1. Does this mean we're not getting our mangos?

n/t

[gateley]

2. I don't know if it will get THAT bad! nt