India and Pakistan, nuclear rivals
On January 9, 2025, 17 employees of the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission (PAEC) working at the Qabul Khel Uranium mining facility were abducted in the militancy-hit province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa (KPK), neighboring Afghanistan. Their abductors, the Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan (TTP), also known as the Pakistani Taliban, demanded the release of militants and their families held in government custody. Eight abductees were released on the same day after frantic efforts by tribal elders and security forces; two others, including a deceased individual, were released two weeks later as a goodwill gesture by the TTP. The whereabouts of the remaining abductees remains uncertain. This was not the first such attack: in 2018, three employees of PAEC were killed and 13 others injured in a suicide attack near the city of Attock; in 2012 and 2007, Kamra Airbase – alleged to house nuclear weapons – was attacked; and in 2008, over 70 employees of the Pakistan Ordinance Factory were killed in twin suicide attacks in the Wah cantonment – an alleged nuclear assembly site.
In August 2024, across the border in India, police arrested three individuals in a sting operation who were allegedly trying to sell 50 grams of radioactive element Californium in the state of Bihar. A month before that, five individuals in possession of a stolen radiography camera from the Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC) were arrested in the city of Dehradun, Uttarakhand state. In early 2022, the police in neighboring Nepal arrested eight, including two Indian nationals, on allegations of attempted smuggling and selling natural uranium. A year before that, the Nepali Metropolitan Police arrested four for attempting to sell 2.5 kg U238, which was brought over by an accused’s father-in-law, decades earlier from a uranium mine in India. In 2021, the Indian Anti-Terror Squad arrested two men in the Indian state of Maharashtra in possession of 7.1 kg of natural uranium, U238. After interrogation, they confessed purchasing that the metal from a scrap dealer.
These examples aptly illustrate the nuclear security challenges that South Asian neighbors still face more than half a century into their nuclear journeys. Home to 1.67 billion people – almost 20% of the global population— India and Pakistan present a disconcerting picture. On the one hand, there is high poverty and corruption, low human development, weak governance, historical hostilities, and geopolitical competition, and the region is rife with terrorism and insurgencies. On the other hand, the proliferation of nuclear weapons, sophisticated delivery means, expansion of civilian and military nuclear facilities, and utilization of peaceful uses of the atom for hundreds of industrial and medical applications paints another. Prima facie, such a regional sketch presents a recipe for catastrophe if left unmitigated.
The nuclear landscape: capabilities, constraints and prospects
Both, nuclear weapons and facilities are growing in South Asia. Currently, India operates 23 nuclear power reactors, seven under construction, one decommissioned, and five research reactors. The Indian Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) has licensed 520 nuclear medical facilities throughout India. According to SIPRI India currently possesses 172 nuclear warheads and runs a full nuclear fuel cycle, producing both weapons-grade plutonium and HEU for its nuclear weapons program. India has an unsafeguarded fast-breeder reactor at the Indra Gandhi Centre for Atomic Research (IGCAR) Kalpakkam, which is another plutonium production reactor near Mumbai. It also has an enrichment facility at Mysore and Chitradurga, Karnataka, and reprocessing sites operated by the BARC at Trombay, Tarapur, and Kalpakkam.
Since receiving its Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) waiver in 2008, India has worked to galvanize its nuclear industry to achieve nuclear energy demands. But bureaucratic red tape and liability laws from the 1984 Bhopal tragedy have hindered progress. However, signs of change are emerging. Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman recently proposed amending the Indian Atomic Energy Act 1963 and the Civil Liability for Nuclear Damage Act 2010 to attract greater foreign investment. This move could boost nuclear infrastructure sector while also creating nuclear security challenges.
Pakistan, on the other hand, has six nuclear power plants, one under construction and one decommissioned reactor. Pakistan operates two research reactors at the Pakistan Institute of Nuclear Science and Technology (PINSTECH). Close to 80 hospitals in the country operate nuclear or radiological facilities for peaceful purposes. On the military side, SPIRI estimates Pakistan has 170 nuclear warheads, operates two uranium enrichment facilities, one at Sihala, near Islamabad and the other at Kahuta Research Labs (KRL), four heavy water reactors in Kushhab, and two reprocessing plants, one at PINSTECH and the other at the Chashma site.
Pakistan’s civilian nuclear development has been stymied by NSG restrictions, as it is non-signatory to the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT). Unlike India, Pakistan has not been afforded an NSG waiver, even after trying through diplomatic attempts or hard tactics of blocking important discussions on a future fissile materials treaty at the conference on disarmament. China remains the only nuclear-supplying state member of the NSG to remain eligible for nuclear cooperation under a “grandfathered agreement” predating its membership in 2004. Nonetheless, despite these limitations, nuclear energy expansion has remained a vision of Pakistani governments as part of the overall energy policy. The PAEC envisions generating 8.8 GWe of nuclear energy by 2030, which also signals the need to address challenges.
Divergent Nuclear Security Perceptions in South Asia
The unexpected collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 exacerbated the threat posed by loose nuclear and radiological materials, as economic collapse, political instability, and weakened governmental controls followed. The fears back then were less of nuclear terrorism but mainly that criminal networks and rogue states could access nuclear and radiological materials. However, terrorist attacks on 9/11 fundamentally reshaped ideas on nuclear security. The threat of transnational terrorist groups such as Al-Qaeda getting their hands on a nuclear or radiological “dirty bomb” and the cataclysmic impact on global security it would pose became a chief concern. The influence of these incidents, alongside the regional environment and organizational developments, have also shaped nuclear security in South Asia.
By all Indian accounts, India’s nuclear security perceptions have been shaped by Pakistan supported militant groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM), accused of carrying-out terrorism throughout decades. Recently, India has also been concerned with the Chinese backing of left-leaning separatist groups, including the United Liberation Front Asom-Independent (ULFA-I) and National Socialist Council of Nagaland (Isak-Muivah), fighting in the northeast. The cyber-attack on the Kudankulam Nuclear Power Plant to steal intellectual data in 2019 by the North Korean state-sponsored group Lazarus has also made cyber threats a key part of India’s threat perceptions.
Pakistan’s nuclear security perceptions have evolved with its nuclear journey. In its nascent covert bomb-making phase, the principal threat it anticipated was of sabotage or decapitating strikes on its nuclear facilities by the U.S., India, or Israel. These fears stemmed from reports of the Carter administration considering sabotaging Pakistan’s early attempts at enrichment in 1979, and later by Israel’s air strikes on Iraq’s Osirak nuclear reactor in 1981. After the May 1998 nuclear tests, as the international community came to accept Pakistan’s nuclear status as a fait accompli, these fears subsided. However, the reverberations of the 9/11 attacks coupled with A.Q. Khan Network exposés compelled it to focus on threats posed by non-state actors and insiders.
Building institutional and global framework for nuclear security
India was one of the first Asian countries to embark on nuclear research, with the establishment of the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in 1945, two years before its independence. Shortly after independence, India enacted the Atomic Energy Act of 1948, for peaceful use of atomic technologies. Later, it was repealed by the Atomic Energy Act of 1962, which provided a comprehensive legal framework, expanding the regulatory power of the government, over nuclear safety, security, and licensing. Under the powers conferred by the 1962 Act, the Indian Atomic Energy Regulatory Board (AERB) was established in 1983 as an apex regulator of the entire nuclear program. The National Investigation Agency (NIA), founded in 2008, has the mandate to investigate nuclear or terrorism-related incidents.
India is a party to the Conventions on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials (CPPNM) and supports the IAEA INFIRC/225/rev.5 on Nuclear Security Recommendation on Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials and Facilities. India has signed and ratified the International Convention on Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism (ICSANT) and is a partner of the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism (GICNT). It also participated actively in the President Obama-led Nuclear Security Summits (NSS) from 2010 to 2016 and signed an India-specific IAEA Additional Protocol on parts of its civilian nuclear facilities. India has submitted four UN Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1540 implementation reports.
Like India, Pakistan benefited from the U.S. Atoms for Peace program in 1953 and established the Pakistan Atomic Energy Commission in 1956— later codified under the PAEC Ordinance 1965 – to oversee all civilian nuclear development in the country. Currently, Pakistan’s legislative regime encompasses the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority (PNRA) Ordinance 2001, which establishes an independent civil nuclear regulator, and the Strategic Export Control Act 2004, which promulgates export controls over dual-use CBRN technologies. The most important nuclear legislation in Pakistan is the National Command Authority Act (NCA) 2010, which established the NCA as the apex policymaking authority to govern all nuclear matters. This law also establishes the Strategic Plans Division (SPD), which is the secretariat, research, and policy advisory body of the NCA.
At the international stage, Pakistan is a party to the CPPNM and its 2005 amendment, a partner in GICNT, and like India, has also participated in all four NSS processes. Pakistan also passed the IAEA’s Nuclear Security Recommendation on Physical Protection Rev. 5 as part of the domestic law titled Regulation on Physical Protection of Nuclear Materials and Nuclear Installations PAK/225 in 2019. Pakistan has also submitted six national implementation reports to the implementation committee of UNSCR 1540.
Unresolved vulnerabilities: gaps in regional nuclear security
While nuclear security has come a long way in the region, thanks to the legislative, organizational, and international collaborations by India and Pakistan, several issues need to be addressed.
Unlike India, Pakistan has not signed the ICSANT 2005. Pakistan’s position, according to SPD officials, is that their internal review process is complete, and they can ratify it any day. However, Pakistan wants to use ratification as part of a potential bargaining chip with the international community on a possible waiver or membership to the NSG alongside India.
Pakistan can also improve the separation of its civilian and military programs. Due to its peculiar history, its strategic nuclear program had overlaps with its civilian program in organizational and practical points of view. Though all of Pakistan’s civilian nuclear facilities are under the IAEA safeguards, it can add further international trust by negotiating and implementing a Pakistan-specific Additional Protocol agreement.
As one of the earliest nuclear operators, India still lacks an independent nuclear regulator despite repeated attempts. The Indian AERB reports to the Atomic Energy Commission. The AEC’s chairman is the secretary of the Department of Atomic Energy, who is responsible for promoting nuclear energy in India. After the Fukushima nuclear disaster in 2011, the Indian government introduced the Nuclear Safety Regulatory Authority (NSRA) bill to establish an independent regulator, and again in 2015, after the Integrated Regulatory Review Service by the IAEA recommended it. However, there is yet no headway.
Assessing the full extent of nuclear security instances in India and Pakistan is challenging. First, nuclear issues are considered a sensitive topic, and second, both rivals feel that discussing nuclear security incidents would tarnish their reputations. A strong cultural emphasis on honor and shame in South Asian leads to either denial or silence about potential security incidents. For example, government of Pakistan has not officially commented on the recent abduction, while PAEC initially denied the workers’ affiliation when their IDs were shared publicly. Similarly, in India, theft of nuclear or radiological materials is downplayed to by denying their nuclear nature. While secrecy can enhance security, excessive opacity fosters mistrust. Transparency can help build greater trust in the security apparatus. This problem is more pronounced in Pakistan, where the nature of the state oscillates between military rule and hybrid democracies.
Another area in which both sides can work is greater engagement with international nonproliferation communities. Since the first Nuclear Threat Initiative’s (NTI) Nuclear Security Index report came out in 2012, Pakistan has improved its overall score by 18 points and India by 7. While this shows improvement, both still lie in the 19th and 20th spots, second only to North Korea and Iran, respectively. However, their rankings can improve further if they engage such bodies to showcase the best policies and practices adopted in their respective nations. This can elevate their reputation and increase international trust in their security architecture. Although, neither side officially engages with NTI, many government-funded or government-aligned think-tanks proudly highlight their improved rankings.
Despite common histories, cultures, language, and traditions, South Asian neighbors do not have any formal or informal institutional mechanism in place to collaborate on shared best practices and lessons learned about nuclear security. While both sides engage with international bodies like the IAEA on Nuclear Security Guidance Committee, Global Nuclear Safety and Security Networks, to name some, effective collaboration in mutual challenges has been hostage to deteriorating bilateral ties. There is a sharing of IAEA’s best practices on nuclear safety and security, which is important, but the regional knowledge base would be far more useful in similar cultural environments. There is already the 2007 bilateral “Agreement on Reducing the Risk from Accidents Relating to Nuclear Weapons” between the two sides that can act as a stepping stone for future cooperation.
Finally, it is pertinent to mention that the security incidents mentioned earlier did not occur in the absence of a robust and comprehensive nuclear security architecture in place; rather, they occurred even then. This shows that nuclear security regimes and best practices can shield programs, people, and facilities from causing nuclear and radiological incidents, mitigating the risks, and reducing the impact of incidents. However, such a regime cannot meaningfully address the external environment that first causes these incidents.
For this, a comprehensive national security overhaul is required to significantly address the challenges of the state of society, economy, development, law and order, and governance. This is imperative in the era where emerging and disruptive technologies and climate change will impact comprehensive state and international security. The theory on insider threats highlights MICE– Money, Ideology, Coercion, and Ego–as key motivators for problematic behavior. However, MICE can motivate even outside-the-program actors to cause serious security issues. As long as there is poverty, ideologically inspired violent groups, weak governance, and law and order, people will find areas to exploit for financial gain – nuclear or not. As long as a vulnerability exists, people can be coerced or inspired to carry out security incidents, including attacks on nuclear facilities and their operators.
Charting a Safer Future
Addressing future South Asian nuclear challenges requires a holistic approach: greater transparency in incident reporting, strengthening independent regulatory mechanisms, and enhanced regional cooperation between the two rivals. Crucially, enhancing nuclear security requires adopting an inclusive national security approach that encompasses human development, good governance and law and order. Together, these steps pave the way for a more secure region.
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The Italian version of this article is published on Aspenia 1-2025
