By Ankit Panda
The Nuclear Threat Initiative’s 2014 Security Index places India below China and Pakistan for nuclear security.
Earlier this week, the Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) released its 2014 Security Index, “a unique public assessment of nuclear materials security conditions in 176 countries, developed with the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU).” The NTI Security Index this year ranked India below both Pakistan and China for nuclear material security – a troubling finding for India’s civil nuclear ambitions. The NTI Security Index ranks states with weapons-usable nuclear materials (a list of 25 countries).
India received an overall score of 41 out of a possible 100, based on an aggregated average of several factors including quantities and sites, security and control measures, compliance with global norms, domestic commitments and capacity, and risk environment. China received 64 points, ranking at 20th overall, and Pakistan eked out India with 46 points for 22nd place. The only two countries scoring worse than India on the NTI’s index are Iran and North Korea. Interestingly, India scored worse than Iran and North Korea for its risk environment. India’s best category, meanwhile, was its compliance with global norms, despite being non-signatory to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. See page 120 of the full PDF report for a more detailed description of the NTI’s findings for India.
The Hindu picked up the NTI’s findings and reported that India’s low score is due a number of factors, “including weak regulations that are written as guidance rather than as requirements; increasing quantities of weapons-usable nuclear materials for both civilian and military use and gaps in its regulatory structure such as a lack of an independent regulatory agency.” On this last point, the NTI report notes that even though India has pledged to establish an independent regulatory agency, progress on this matter has been stalled due to bureaucratic and political factors.
Read the full story at The Diplomat