Please go and sign this petition at thepetitionsite.com!
President Bush has proposed sweeping exemptions from US nuclear trade law, practice, and non-proliferation laws in order to provide nuclear technology and fuel to India, even though India has not signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and has conducted nuclear test explosions.This could a set a dangerous precedent and severely damage the NPT. With the importation of nuclear fuel, India could use its uranium reserves to increase its nuclear weapons output.
The US should not expand nuclear trade with any state if it comes at the expense of efforts to curb the spread of nuclear weapons.
Congress can still make changes to the deal, however. Congress should establish a set of tough, but reasonable conditions that a non-NPT country must meet to become eligible for civilian nuclear trade with the United States. These include halting the production of highly enriched uranium and stopping the separation of plutonium for nuclear weapons, making a binding commitment not to conduct nuclear tests, accepting IAEA full-scope safeguards on all nuclear facilities and materials, and maintaining a strong export control system.
Tell Congress and key decision makers to say "No" to breaking the nonproliferation rules upon which our security depends.
If we expect certain countries to curb/cease/abstain from the production and proliferation of weapons - nuclear, biological and otherwise - we have to honor the same standards that we expect and in fact, demand, from other nations. (this is actually called "the Golden Rule" - it was posted on the wall in my 1st grade classroom).
It is counter-productive to the objective of peace and the survival of the human race to proclaim that the United States has the right to bear arms and produce and trade weapons of mass destruction while simultaneously asserting that other countries have no right to do the same, unless of course, we decide that they're trustworthy (the standards by which this is determined remains a mystery to everyone except for the idiots who are perpetrating these shenanigans against treaties).
It is a simple concept that even a child can understand, that you can not tell other people to do one thing, while you do the opposite thing, without them wanting to kill you. Our U.S. government needs to rise to this most basic logic and honor Non-Proliferation treaties in the exact same manner that we expect of others.