President Donald Trump has told Congress he is pursuing a civil nuclear pact with Saudi Arabia that does not include non-proliferation safeguards the U.S. has long said would ensure the kingdom does not develop nuclear weapons, according to a copy of the document sent to Congress and reviewed.
Trump, a Republican, and former President Joe Biden, a Democrat, have worked with Saudi Arabia on paths to building the first civil nuclear power plants for the kingdom.
The development comes amid fears of a new global nuclear arms race following the expiration earlier this month of the last strategic arms limitation treaty between Russia and the United States, and China’s moves to expand its own nuclear arsenal.
Arms control groups and many Democrats and some leading Republicans – including Secretary of State Marco Rubio when he served in the Senate – have insisted that any agreement come with guardrails, including that Saudi Arabia not have the ability to enrich uranium or to reprocess spent nuclear fuel, potential pathways to weapons, demands also made by successive U.S. administrations.
They also insist that Saudi Arabia agree to the so-called Additional Protocol that grants the U.N.’s International Atomic Energy Agency broad and more intrusive oversight of a country’s nuclear activities, such as the power to carry out snap inspections at undeclared locations.
The Trump administration sent an initial report to leaders on some congressional committees in November, a copy of which was seen by Reuters, that it is required to send if it is not pursuing the Additional Protocol, the Arms Control Association, an advocacy group, said on Thursday.
The report “raises concerns that the Trump administration has not carefully considered the proliferation risks posed by its proposed nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia or the precedent this agreement may set,” Kelsey Davenport, the head of nonproliferation policy for ACA, said in an article published on Thursday.
Trump’s report to Congress says that the draft U.S.-Saudi pact on civil nuclear, known as a 123 Agreement, puts the U.S. industry at the heart of Saudi Arabia’s civil nuclear development, ensuring nuclear-proliferation safeguards are in place.