The Trump administration has submitted to Congress a nuclear cooperation agreement with Saudi Arabia that could allow the kingdom to enrich its own fuel for nuclear reactors, according to two officials with firsthand knowledge of the transmission of the agreement.
The accord, announced by the White House last month, would deepen ties between the United States and Saudi Arabia at a moment when the war with Iran has strained the relationship between the two countries. The 30-year agreement would give U.S. companies a central role in developing Saudi Arabia’s civilian nuclear infrastructure while largely shutting out foreign competitors.
The submission formally begins a congressional review process required under Section 123 of the Atomic Energy Act, which gives such nuclear cooperation accords their shorthand name, “123 agreements.” Unlike treaties, they do not require approval by two-thirds of the Senate. Instead, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and House Foreign Affairs Committee review the agreement during a period totaling 90 days that Congress is in continuous session. Unless Congress passes a joint resolution rejecting the agreement during that period, the accord can take effect without an affirmative vote by either chamber.
The transmission of the agreement to Congress was reported earlier by The Wall Street Journal.
The prospect that Saudi Arabia could enrich uranium — the technology at the center of the conflict with Iran — has drawn sharp opposition from some Democratic lawmakers and revived longstanding concerns about nuclear proliferation in the region.
“This deal is the starting gun for a Middle East nuclear arms race,” Senators Edward J. Markey of Massachusetts and Jeff Merkley of Oregon, along with Representatives John Garamendi of California and Donald S. Beyer Jr. of Virginia, wrote in an essay last month. The four Democrats contended that the agreement should require Saudi Arabia to forgo the production of weapons-grade uranium and accept the International Atomic Energy Agency’s most stringent inspection standards.
“Congress must reject it,” they wrote.
The lawmakers also said that President Trump’s launching a war with Iran over the country’s nuclear ambitions while negotiating a nuclear agreement with Saudi Arabia was a fundamental contradiction to U.S. nuclear policy in the region. “That contradiction doesn’t make America stronger,” they wrote. “It makes American policy impossible to take seriously.”
Energy Secretary Chris Wright and Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, the Saudi energy minister, signed the agreement last month as part of a broader package of cooperation on civilian nuclear power. The two officials also signed what the administration described as a bilateral agreement on nuclear safeguards.
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