Pakistan Threatens Nuke Arms Race Over India Deal

Remember all those assertions from the Bush administration and the Indian government that the nuclear deal between the two countries wouldn't spark an arms race?

Forget them.

The BBC just ran this:

Pakistan has asked the US to address what it calls its legitimate needs in the civilian use of nuclear power.

Pakistan's Foreign Minister, Kursheed Kasuri, has called for a similar approach to be adopted towards India and Pakistan on nuclear issues.

During talks with the senior US diplomat Richard Boucher, he said this was needed to prevent an arms race.

The BBC correspondent in Islamabad says the talks were largely focused on last month's India-US nuclear deal.

That's about as clear a threat as you ever get in diplomacy-speak. "Give us the same deal or we start a nuclear and conventional arms race". (Actually, it's already started and the Bush administration are happily selling to all sides.)

Meanwhile, the Federation of American Scientists has issued a statement against the US-India nuclear deal and is pressing Congress to kill it saying that "the agreement with India is contrary to the long-term security of the United States, India and the world."

Sensible folks, those scientists at FAS. After all, they were founded "in 1945 by scientists associated with the Manhattan Project that built the first atom bomb" so they might just know what they are talking about.