New Delhi, Oct 22 (IANS) Ahead of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Washington next month, an American nuclear expert Thursday said India’s failure to sign the CTBT could affect its prospects for a permanent seat in the UN Security Council.
“If China ratifies the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), the spotlight will fall on Pakistan and India,” said Rodney W. Jones, a nuclear expert and former US official who served in the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency in the negotiations for the Strategic Arms Control Treaty (START) treaty.

It’s reasonable for India to assume that resuming nuclear testing or not signing the CTBT could affect its chances for a permanent seat in the UNSC, he said. There are also other claimants like Japan for the UNSC, he said in an interaction with experts at the think tank, Observer Research Foundation.

Jones, however, added that it would probably take one or two years before the CTBT is ratified by the US Senate as the US establishment is right now preoccupied with more pressing issues like the global financial crisis and domestic health care and insurance.

Jones is currently president of Policy Architects International, a consulting firm in Virginia that covers strategic, international security and Asian development issues.

He has authored definitive books on the nuclear situation including “Religious Radicalism and Nuclear Confrontation in South Asia” and “Tracking Nuclear Proliferation: A Guide in Maps and Charts”.

Alluding to recent statements by some nuclear scientists and officials in India questioning its nuclear deterrence capability, Jones said they may have wanted to tie the hands of the the Manmohan Singh government to ensure that India is not the first to sign the CTBT.

Manmohan Singh will go to Washington Nov 24 on the first state visit to be hosted by the Barack Obama administration amid speculation about pressure on India from the US to sign the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and CTBT.

Issues relating to nuclear non-proliferation and India-US civil nuclear deal will be high on the agenda during the visit.

US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton Wednesday said the US wants India to be a “major player” in working out a new non-proliferation regime.

India has opposed both the NPT and CTBT as it sees them as discriminatory treaties that divide the world into the nuclear haves and have-nots.