International Atomic Energy Agency Director General Rafel Mariano Grossi met Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif on Wednesday. Though the official release was positive, the elephant of Pakistan’s nuclear weapon must have been in the room. Pakistan and the IAEA have an uneasy relationship, mainly because of those weapons. On the one hand, Pakistan has been an active member, repeatedly serving on its board of directors, and with its nuclear scientists serving on its staff. On the other, it is one of those states whose ratification was necessary for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty to come into effect. Pakistan has bot even signed. The CTBT represents a nuclear regime in which existing nuclear powers are privileged, while all others are forbidden to have any nuclear weapons. The existing nuclear powers are also the victors of World War II, and the CTBT is thus an effort to freeze the postwar world order in place.
This ignores the fact that the IAEA supports much non-weapons use of nuclear power, as it is supposed to supervise that. It is important for Pakistan that it receives such support, for it has found that its venturing into many of the fields of nuclear technology has required the kind of support the IES provides. One of the most interesting fields where cooperation is necessary is small modular reactors, which can provide up to 300 MW per unit, and which are much cheaper than the six reactors of 3530 MW already installed. Their safety is a primary concern at the moment. There are also useful applications of nuclear energy in medicine (particularly treatment of certain cancers) and agriculture (in developing new crop strains), where IAEA help is useful.
There is an unfortunate tendency to look at nuclear power from the point of view of nuclear weapons. This may be understandable, considering the nation’s travails, which started ever since India exploded its first device in 1974. The then PM, Zulfikar Ali Bhutto decided, at a meeting of nuclear scientists, to build a device, but it is not often remarked that there was a cadre of nuclear scientists, then all engaged in peaceful pursuits, available for the task. Pakistan at that time converted its ploughshares into swords. The IAEA is dedicated to converting them back, and while that might not be possible so long as India keeps bristling with nuclear weapons, whatever cooperation is useful to Pakistan should go ahead.
