Left to oppose N-deal with US

New Delhi: Notwithstanding Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's strong defence of the nuclear deal with the US, the Left parties on Thursday resolved to oppose the agreement both inside and outside Parliament calling it a continuation of the Pro-American shift in India's foreign policy.

In fact, India continues to give more concessions compared to what the US has to offer, the CPI (M) and the CPI said.

Besides there is no clear-cut commitment by the US on India's permanent membership of the United Nations Security Council, both the parties said.

''India, as a major developing country, needs to have a balanced and equitable relationship with the US. The Joint statement does not give much credence to this aspect,'' the CPI (M) Politburo said in a statement.

The CPI secretariat said the agreement amounted to a universal reversal of India's earlier nuclear policy without any prior discussion in Parliament, or with the UPA or the Left whereas the US would have to seek agreement from its Congress.

In Washington, the Prime Minister had yesterday asserted that the nuclear pact reached with the US would not lead to any diminution of India's strategic nuclear capabilities, and that it was not a one-sided deal.

Earlier criticising the deal, former Prime Minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee lashed out at the UPA government for ''compromising India's flexibility in regard to its credible nuclear deterrent''.