India has subscribed to an international code of conduct against indiscriminate spread of ballistic missile technology, once again reaffirming its commitment to global non-proliferation objectives.
India has joined the Hague Code of Conduct against Ballistic Missile Proliferation (or HCoC in short) by notifying Austria, the designated “central contact” of the convention, official spokesperson of the Ministry of External Affairs, Vikas Swarup, told journalists in New Delhi on Thursday.
The HCoC, adopted in 2002, is a voluntary, legally non-binding international confidence-building and transparency measure that seeks to prevent the proliferation of ballistic missiles that are capable of delivering weapons of mass destruction. New Delhi said that its joining the HCoC signalled its “readiness to further strengthen global non-proliferation objectives”.
India’s accession took the number of the nations subscribing the HCoC against ballistic missile proliferation to 138. China, Pakistan, Israel and North Korea are among the nations, which are yet to accede to the code despite having significant missile development capability.
India, which did not sign the NPT, had been a pariah for the global non-proliferation regimes till 2008. The Nuclear Supplier Group, which controls global atomic material and technology trade, however granted an exemption to India in 2008, despite its “non-NPT” status.