'Outlier' China Blocking India's Entry Into Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG): US

Washington: The outgoing Obama Administration has hit out at China for blocking India's entry into the elite Nuclear Suppliers Group by describing the communist giant an "outlier".

"Clearly there is one outlier that needs to be addressed and that is China," Nisha Desai Biswal, Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia, told news agency PTI in an interview.

Ms Desai's statement comes just a week before the change of guards in America.  On January 20, the Obama Administration will pass on the baton to the Donald Trump Administration.

Officials say it is because of the resistance from the Chinese side that India could not become a member of the elite nuke club, where all decisions are taken on the basis of consensus.

"The (US) President (Barack Obama) has been very clear and unequivocal that he believes that India has met the criteria for NSG and that the United States supports India's entry that India is ready and India should be brought into the NSG," Ms Biswal said.

"We believe we have made substantial progress on that and as we hand the baton over to the next administration the path forward will be found for that," she said.

Reiterating that India not becoming a NSG member is "disappointing", Ms Biswal said the Obama Administration is "very very gratified to see India's entry into the India's entry into the Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR)".

China is advocating a two-step "non-discriminatory" approach for admission of countries who have not signed nuclear-Non Proliferation Treaty (NPT) in the NSG.

As per the new stand announced by Beijing in November, it first wants to find a solution that is applicable to the admission of all non-NPT members followed by discussions to admit specific non-NPT member.

China's stand for a non-discriminatory criteria is regarded significant as Pakistan, a close ally of Beijing too has applied for the NSG membership along with India.

(with inputs from PTI)