India joins Missile Technology Control Regime today

NEW DELHI: India joins the Missile Technology Control Regime as a full member today. It ' s a massive achievement for the PM Modi government regime, particularly, after a failure on the matter of membership into the 48-nation Nuclear Suppliers Group. Ministry of External Affairs spokesperson named Vikas Swarup on Sunday told, "We applied for the membership of MTCR last year and all the procedural formalities have been completed.  Foreign Secretary S Jaishankar on Monday will ink the document of accession into MTCR in the presence of France Ambassadors, Netherlands and Luxembourg." Since its civil nuclear deal with the US, India has been trying to get into export control regimes like NSG, MTCR, the Australia Group and the Wassenaar Arrangement that regulate the conventional, nuclear, biological and chemicals weapons and technologies. Vikas Swaruo said "this week alone", India got membership into SCO and on Monday "we are going to become full members of MTCR". MTCR membership will enable India to buy high-end missile technology and also enhance its joint ventures with Russia. The MTCR seeks to restrict the proliferation of missiles, complete rocket systems, unmanned air vehicles and related technology for those systems capable of carrying a 500kg payload for at least 300 km. On Friday, India had failed to seek entry into the NSG at the plenary meet in Seoul primarily due to technical objections raised by China. Much to India`s discomfort, China`s objections also got support from a few other members like South Africa, Norway, Brazil, Austria, New Zealand, Ireland and Turkey.