INDIA: A series of bomb blasts rocked eastern India's holy city of Varanasi yesterday, killing at least 15 people and injuring at least 60, 22 of them seriously, police said. Authorities put major cities on high alert as they scrambled to determine what had caused the explosions.
No one has taken responsibility for the explosions, but intelligence officials hinted at the involvement of Islamic militants.
They also claimed to have warned the state authorities repeatedly about the possibility of bomb attacks on several of the city's temples including the affected shrine.
Meanwhile, the prime minister Manmohan Singh told parliament yesterday that India's nuclear pact with the US would in no way affect its nuclear deterrent capabilities, allying critics who accused the government of "selling out" to Washington.
"The ability to maintain a minimum nuclear deterrent is intact," Mr Singh said, adding that there would be no capping of India's strategic programme.
The prime minister was fleshing out the controversial nuclear agreement India reached with visiting US president George Bush last week which it hopes will eventually give it access to long-denied civilian nuclear technology and badly needed atomic fuel.
Under the accord, which still needs approval from the US Congress and the 44-member Nuclear Suppliers Group, India will split its inter-connected civilian and military atomic facilities, placing 14 of its 22 reactors under international inspection by 2014.
In return, it will receive an uninterrupted supply of uranium for the safeguarded nuclear reactors, but will not sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Mr Singh declared that the pact ended years of "troubled relations" between India and the US which were on opposing sides during the cold war years.
Dispelling opposition concerns and those expressed by some of Singh's Congress Party allies, the prime minister stated that India's nuclear policy would continue to be guided by "restraint and responsibility".
India conducted its first nuclear test in 1974 followed by five others in 1998 and thereafter embarked on an ambitious programme to construct a robust strategic deterrence, as well as the means to carry weapons of mass destruction. And though it has repeatedly declared its deterrence is not directed at any specific country, analysts believe it is aimed at neighbours China and Pakistan.
US opponents say the deal with India abandons long-standing global non-proliferation principles and disciplines and will complicate efforts to curb the spread of atomic weapons elsewhere, in Iran and North Korea, for instance.