ELECTIONS '98
COMMENTARY
SPECIALS
INTERVIEWS
CAPITAL BUZZ
REDIFF POLL
DEAR REDIFF
THE STATES
YEH HAI INDIA!
ARCHIVES

Japan is thinking of freezing aid

Japan says it is considering freezing economic aid to protest New Delhi's decision to go ahead with nuclear weapons tests.

''It is extremely regrettable that India conducted such a test,'' Foreign Minister Keizo Obuchi told Indian Ambassador to Japan Siddharth Singh, who was summoned to meet him at parliament.

''We are afraid the latest testing could harm the stability of the region,'' he was told.

India surprised the world yesterday when it detonated three underground nuclear explosions, its first tests since May 1974.

Obuchi urged India to stop its development of nuclear arms immediately.

The Japanese cabinet will meet shortly to discuss suspending development aid.

''We cannot help but consider taking measures in the area of our economic assistance,'' Obuchi said.

Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto says he plans to propose joint action against India during the Birmingham summit of the Group of Seven industrialised countries this weekend.

In 1995, Japan temporarily froze its loans to China to protest the country's nuclear testing.

Officials in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the only two cities in the world to have ever suffered atomic attacks, reacted strongly.

Hiroshima Mayor Takashi Hiraoka condemned the tests, saying their timing shortly after an atomic bombing exhibition in Bombay was extremely deplorable.

In Nagasaki, Mayor Itcho Ito said, ''It was such a shock I can't even express in words how strongly I was struck. The action is a serious offence that ravages the wishes of victims and citizens of Nagasaki.''

Sweden also criticised the nuclear test. Prime Minister Gortan Persson said, ''I am shocked. The tests are completely inacceptable.''

Persson said Sweden could not rule out reducing its development aid to New Delhi. He said the government in Stockholm expected a united and clear reaction from the European Union.

UNI

Tell us what you think of this report