Pakistan Has More Than 100 Nukes: Experts

Doubled arsenal surpasses India's
By Matt Cantor,  Newser Staff
Posted Jan 31, 2011 10:39 AM CST
Pakistan Has More Than 100 Nukes: Experts
Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari meets with President Barack Obama in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington, Friday, Jan. 14, 2011.   (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

Pakistan likely has more than 100 deployed nuclear weapons, or twice what it had just a few years ago, analysts tell the Washington Post. The country has sped up its uranium and plutonium production, and devised new delivery systems for it, pushing its nuclear capabilities ahead of India’s. That's unlikely to sit well with the US, which has been pushing nonproliferation in the region, but Pakistan has long complained that restrictions on its nuclear growth unfairly favor India.

“Pakistan lives in a tough neighborhood and will never be oblivious to its security needs,” says a Pakistani official. Pakistan has also irked the US by being the lone holdout preventing international adoption of President Obama’s “fissile materials cutoff treaty,” the Post notes, and American “patience is running out,” says a US official. Aiming for adoption of the treaty this year, the US may be forced to address its concerns head-on—something it’s been reluctant to do for fear of rattling the volatile region.
(More Pakistan stories.)

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