US firms must make own risk assessment on n-deal: US envoy

Insurance pools will be part of the solution to the concerns about the liability issue, says Richard Verma

 

US officials Sunday called the understanding on the stalled India-US civil nuclear deal a "breakthrough", but said it was up to the companies to do their own risk assessment before entering into commercial contracts.

The two sides have come to "an understanding of the liability" issue, and that it will operate "through a memorandum of law within the Indian system", US Ambassador to India Richard Verma told US reporters accompanying President Barack Obama.

But it's up to the companies to do their own risk assessment, and that it's not something that would "require at this stage a legislative undertaking", he was quoted as saying in a pool report.

Verma made it clear that the understanding is between the two governments and that "it's up to the companies what to do".

The US, he said, has gotten reassurances that the way they interpret liability in a way that "comports with international understandings".

Insurance pools will be part of the solution to the concerns about the liability issue, Verma said.

Deputy National Security Advisor Ben Rhodes called the civil nuclear deal a "breakthrough" and said this and other agreements were "a sign that the US and India are moving past snags and toward a relationship in which they are stronger partners on the global stage".

Verma, according to the pool report, said Obama and Prime Minister Narendra Modi "articulated a different understanding" of the relationship between the US and India, with the civil nuclear deal being an important part of it.

Since November, the contacts groups set in motion by Modi and Obama have been talking about the liability issue and also how to account for nuclear materials.

The group met three times and came up with an understanding on both subjects.