ISLAMABAD: Pakistan and India have exchanged lists of their nuclear installations and strategic facilities today (Friday) as part of an agreement between the two countries, which restricts them from attacking each other’s atomic facilities in case of war.
According to a statement issued by Foreign Office, the annual exchange is mandated by Article-II of the Agreement on Prohibition of Attacks against Nuclear Installations and Facilities between Pakistan and India, signed on December 31, 1988. It has been implemented consecutively since January 1, 1992.
As part of the exchange, the Foreign Office handed over its list to the Indian High Commission while the Indian Ministry of External Affairs handed over a similar list to an officer of the Pakistan High Commission in New Delhi.
Under the agreement, both the parties are to “refrain from undertaking, encouraging or participating in, directly or indirectly, any action aimed at causing the destruction of, or damage to, any nuclear installation or facility in the other country”.
Present ties between the two remain particularly strained due to a string of recent developments beginning from the Feb 2019 Pulwama suicide attack, which India blamed on Pakistan, in which 44 of its soldiers were killed in occupied Kashmir.
A few days later, the two nuclear states came on the brink of war after an aerial dogfight between the two air forces, resulting in the downing of two Indian fighter planes.
In June, Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI), a leading US non-proliferation watchdog, ranked Pakistan as the most improved in security of those countries holding nuclear materials, improving its overall score by seven points.
