Senators criticized the US administration on Wednesday for not being transparent with lawmakers on a controversial civilian nuclear deal with India.
Legislators were particularly interested in an agreement being negotiated with New Delhi detailing the landmark deal clinched on March 2 by US President George W. Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.
The deal would allow India, which is not a signatory of the nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty, access to long-denied civilian nuclear technology in return for placing a majority of its atomic reactors under international safeguards.
Speaking at a hearing on the deal, Democratic Senator Joseph Biden charged that the administration had "reneged" on a promise to share drafts of the bilateral nuclear agreement.
The US had sought a provision in the agreement that nuclear cooperation would be discontinued if India conducts a nuclear test, but New Delhi has flatly rejected the suggestion, officials have said.
Biden said that the administration also had yet to answer a deluge of questions posed by lawmakers, or share with them the full list of India's civil nuclear facilities -- "even in classified form."
He wanted the administration's "negotiating record" on the question of international safeguards that Indian nuclear reactors would be subject to.
The International Atomic Energy Agency, the UN global nuclear watchdog, is still negotiating with India on the safeguards.
"All the parties involved in the negotiations, including the Bush administration, should facilitate the maximum amount of transparency possible, so that Congress is better equipped to make informed judgments," said Republican Senator Dick Lugar, who heads the Senate Foreign Relations Committee which held a hearing on Wednesday.
Lugar said that he had himself submitted to the administration 90 questions -- aside from 82 questions that have already been answered -- following extensive April 5 congressional testimony on the deal by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice.
"We appreciate the administration's attention to these questions as the committee carefully works through the intricacies of the nuclear agreement," Lugar said.
For it to be effective, the nuclear agreement has to be approved by Congress.
Until the administration answers lawmakers' questions and provides them details on the deal, "we simply should not act on its proposed legislation," Biden said.
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