Remarks to a Joint Session of Parliament in New Delhi

Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, March 27, 2000

I can also repeat what I said at the outset: India is a leader, a great nation, which by virtue of its size, its achievements, and its example, has the ability to shape the character of our time. For any of us, to claim that mantle and assert that status is to accept first and foremost that our actions have consequences for others beyond our borders. Great nations with broad horizons must consider whether actions advance or hinder what Nehru called the largest cause of humanity.

So India's nuclear policies, inevitably, have consequences beyond your borders, eroding the barriers against the spread of nuclear weapons, discouraging nations that have chosen to foreswear these weapons, encouraging others to keep their options open. But if India's nuclear test shook the world, India's leadership for nonproliferation can certainly move the world.

India and the United States have reaffirmed our commitment to forgo nuclear testing. And for that I thank the Prime Minister, the Government, and the people of India. But in our own self-interest--and I say this again--in our own self-interest we can do more. I believe both nations should join the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, work to launch negotiations on a treaty to end the production of fissile materials for nuclear weapons, strengthen export controls. And India can pursue defense policies in keeping with its commitment not to seek a nuclear or missile arms race, which the Prime Minister has forcefully reaffirmed just in these last couple of days.

Again, I do not presume to speak for you or to tell you what to decide. It is not my place. You are a great nation, and you must decide. But I ask you to continue our dialog on these issues, and let us turn our dialog into a genuine partnership against proliferation. If we make progress in narrowing our differences, we will be both more secure, and our relationship can reach its full potential.

I hope progress can also be made in overcoming a source of tension in this region, including the tensions between India and Pakistan. I share many of your Government's concerns about the course Pakistan is taking, your disappointment that past overtures have not always met with success, your outrage over recent violence. I know it is difficult to be a democracy bordered by nations whose government rejects democracy.

But I also believe--I also believe India has a special opportunity, as a democracy, to show its neighbors that democracy is about dialog. It does not have to be about friendship, but is it about building working relationships among people who differ.

One of the wisest things anyone ever said to me is that you don't make peace with your friends. That is what the late Israeli Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin told me before he signed the Oslo accords with the Palestinians, with whom he had been fighting for decades. It is well to remember--I remind myself of it all the time, even when I have arguments with Members of the other party in my Congress--[laughter]--you don't make peace with your friends.