NEW DELHI, India The United States has decided to. stockpile nuclear weapons at its naval base on Diego Garica as part of a military buildup on the tiny Indian Ocean atoll, Foreign Minister Bali Ram Bhagat said Friday.
Bhagat made the comment at a seminar on a 1971 UN, declaration pronouncing the Indian Ocean. A zone of peace.
It was the second time in recent days India has charged that the United States was building a nuclear base on the British owned island about 2,000 miles south of Bombay.
The Foreign Ministry’s Annual Report for 1985, issued this week, contained a similar statement that ‘was denied by the U:S. Embassy.
In Washington, a State Department spokesman declined comment on Bhagat’s comments, citing the Reagan administration’s policy ‘of neither confirming nor denying the presence of nuclear weapons at any locations.
Mr Bhagat, however, described the setting up of nuclear base on Diego Garica, as an “ominous portent for the future.”
‘The Pentagon says the facility ‘on Diego Garica is a supply and refueling base for U.S. Navy ships. ‘Washington sources said US. patrol bombers use an air strip on the island, and the site is also reported capable of monitoring Soviet naval communications.
Bhagat said the military buildup on the atoll was of “enormous strategic significance” to India.
“Most of our airfields, port, dockyards, oil installations, communications infrastructure military installations, power projects, fall within the range and surge alliance of aircraft at this base,” he said.
GENEVA Guided tours of the UNN’s Palais des Nations building were halted on weekends and public holidays beginning this weekend. Officials said they took the action because they could no longer afford paying Palais guides on weekends.
Article extracted from this publication >> March 28, 1986
