Rudd won't rethink uranium sale ban

Prime Minister Kevin Rudd wants Australia to move forward from its "on-again,
off-again" relationship with India but he won't consider lifting a ban on uranium
sales to the subcontinent.
Mr Rudd, who arrived in Delhi on Wednesday night, is in India to try to ensure the
relationship begins achieving what Australia believes is its considerable "unmet
potential".
The federal government has flagged India as a foreign policy priority since winning
government but the relationship has been dogged by problems over that period.
India remains eager to buy Australian uranium but the Rudd government overturned a
decision by the coalition to let sales go ahead even though New Delhi hadn't signed
up to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty.
The issue was expected to be canvassed again in meetings on Thursday but Mr Rudd
indicated Australia had no intention of budging from its position.
"Our policy remains governed by the provisions of the non-proliferation treaty, that
has been the case in the past," Mr Rudd told reporters.
"The non-proliferation treaty, and our policy in relation to it as underpinning our
attitude to uranium sales, is not targeted (at) any individual country.
"It has been long-standing Australian government policy."
He reminded New Delhi that Australia, through its membership of the Nuclear
Suppliers Group, was instrumental in getting international support for a deal struck
between India and the United States.
Mr Rudd will meet Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Thursday evening, where
the thorny issue of Indian students in Australia is likely to come up.
Australia has sent a parade of minister to New Delhi in recent months to try to calm
anger after a spate of violent attacks against Indian students turned the spotlight
on problems with the rapidly-expanding education export industry.
India is the second biggest source of students to the sector, which is worth $15.5
billion a year to Australia, making it the third largest export industry.
Ahead of a busy schedule of meetings on Thursday, Mr Rudd reiterated the importance
of the India-Australia relationship.
"India is a fundamentally important relationship for Australia," he told reporters.
"It is so strategically, it is so economically."
Mr Rudd noted that in past decades the relationship with India had been on-again,
off-again.
He didn't blame previous governments but said it was a statement of fact.
"Our challenge for the future... is to turn this stop-start relationship of the past
into one which is on a deeper, broader, comprehensive, strategic basis for the
future," Mr Rudd said.
It appears, though, there could be a way to go before relations get to the level
Australia desires.
Even before Mr Rudd hit the sub-continent, Australian officials risked offending the
Indians by cancelling the Mumbai leg of his journey, blaming bad weather and a
cancelled cricket match for the decision.
It meant a meeting with Indian business leaders was left off his agenda.
It's unclear if there was meant to be a message in the omission of the Australian
flag at a wreath-laying ceremony attended by Mr Rudd and Therese Rein at the iconic
India Gate on Thursday morning.