PM Modi meets Chinese President Xi Jinping and Uzbek President Islom Karimov

On a day on mixed developments for India on its membership bid in the Nuclear Suppliers’ Group (NSG) membership, Canada and Braxil have extended their complete support to New Delhi.

A marathon three-hour post-dinner meeting of the NSG in Seoul on Thursday ended in a deadlock over India’s membership.

Discussions on the issue of India’s entry are expected to continue tomorrow, Friday, in Seoul, on what will be the last day of this NSG plenary meeting.

The MEA also added that notwithstanding the opposition from “one country” India received support from “overwhelming number of those who took the floor” which reflected the “the broad sentiment to take this matter forward”.

Despite an appeal by Prime Minister, Narendra Modi during his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, Beijing remained adamant.

This came even as Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi met with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Tashkent on Thursday on the sidelines of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit with the express objective of convincing him on India’s NSG bid.

Modi, in the meeting, urged Xi to support India’s NSG membership bid ‘on its own merits’. China put a firm foot on India’s membership in NSG stating that the application can not be considered because it has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

Without going into details of deliberations, the official referred to a similar discussion within the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR) to which India was inducted early this month after months of discussions within its member countries. “In other words, the applicant state shall be party to the NPT”. India says the NPT is “flawed and discriminatory”.

China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi, however, has recently said that Beijing’s primary focus for the time being is making India and Pakistan full members of the organization after the organization chose to admit them past year. The issue was raised when India was granted a special waiver in the NSG in 2008, with Chinese support.

Opponents argue that granting India membership would further undermine efforts to prevent proliferation.

The government also highlighted that an “early decision” on India’s NSG application “remains in larger global interest” of energy security and combating climate change.

China today sought to de-link its opposition to India’s membership of NSG from Sino-Indian ties saying that it does not concern the bilateral relationship.