Bush starts campaign for Congress nod

Nicholas Burns, a top State Department official, told an audience Monday at the Heritage Foundation that a "very intensive debate" looms on the accord that he helped to settle last week during Bush's visit to India.

"We're prepared for that debate," Burns said at the conservative think tank. "We will advise the Congress that it is our very clear judgment that this is a good deal for the United States as well as for India."

Burns said Bush, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and other officials would spend the coming weeks briefing lawmakers.

On Tuesday, the White House planned to meet with lawmakers to discuss the agreement. Richard Boucher, the newly appointed assistant secretary of state for South and Central Asia, was to discuss the deal Thursday at a Washington think tank.

Burns said that, "on a deal as esoteric, frankly, and as complex as this one, members of the Senate and House are going to want to see the details and a full explanation, and we intend to give them."

Despite GOP control of Congress, lawmakers have shown a growing tendency to break from Bush's leadership as his popularity has declined and congressional elections approach in November.

The administration will be working to win over a Congress that was cautious, at best, in reacting to news that Bush and Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh had agreed to a deal.

Some critics worried that it could undermine efforts to stop nuclear proliferation. Lawmakers from both political parties said they would wait for the Bush administration to argue its case before deciding whether to vote for nuclear shipments to India.

Singh assured sceptical Indian lawmakers in New Delhi on Tuesday that the pact covering commercial nuclear power will not limit the scope of India's atomic weapons programme. "There will no capping of our strategic programme," he said.

India will open 14 of its 22 nuclear plants for international inspections by 2014 as part of a landmark civilian nuclear cooperation deal with the United States, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said yesterday.

Under the deal, India, which tested nuclear weapons in 1998, has agreed to separate its civilian and military nuclear programmes, allowing international scrutiny for the bulk of its power stations.