US Clearing Hurdles Limiting Nuclear Cooperation With India: Jake Sullivan

The United States National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, who is on a two-day trip to India, said on Monday that the federal government in Washington is finalising necessary steps to remove barriers in India-United States civil nuclear cooperation to give fresh momentum to a landmark deal between the two countries.

"United States is now finalising the necessary steps to remove long-standing regulations that have prevented civil nuclear cooperation between India's leading nuclear entities and US companies," Mr Sullivan said in New Delhi on Monday.

New Delhi and Washington have been discussing the supply of US nuclear reactors to India since the mid-2000s.

The civil nuclear deal was signed in 2007 by then-President George W Bush, a major step toward allowing the United States to sell civilian nuclear technology to India. The two countries agreed in 2019 to build six US nuclear power plants in India.

However, a longstanding obstacle in the corporation has been the need to bring Indian liability rules in line with global norms which require the costs of any accident to be channelled to the operator rather than the maker of a nuclear power plant.

India's strict nuclear compensation laws have previously discouraged foreign power plant builders from cooperating with New Delhi, subsequently deferring its target to add 20,000 MW of nuclear power from 2020 to 2030.

Jake Sullivan is on a two-day visit to New Delhi, days before President-elect Donald Trump is due to be sworn in. His trip was the last high-profile visit to New Delhi by the outgoing Biden administration.

Washington expected the impact of Chinese upstream dams, artificial intelligence, space, military licensing and Chinese economic overcapacity to be discussed while Sullivan is in New Delhi, a US official told news agency Reuters. 

Earlier in the day, Mr Sullivan met India's Foreign Minister Dr S Jaishankar in Delhi and discussed enhancing bilateral, regional and global cooperation.

After the meeting, Mr Jaishankar acknowledged Mr Sullivan's "personal contribution" in strengthening the India-US partnership over the past four years.

"Delighted to meet US NSA @JakeSullivan46 in New Delhi today morning. Continued our ongoing discussions on deepening bilateral, regional and global cooperation. Valued the openness of our conversations in the last four years. Appreciated his personal contribution to forging a closer and stronger India-US partnership," he wrote in a post on X ( previously Twitter)