Here’s the latest from ISPR on a Pakistani test of the country’s Ghauri ballistic missile:

Pakistan today successfully conducted Training Launch of Ghauri Weapon System aimed at testing the operational and technical readiness of Army Strategic Forces Command.

The launch was witnessed by Commander Army Strategic Force Command (ASFC), senior officers from the strategic forces, scientists and engineers of strategic organization.

Commander ASFC appreciated the standard of training and operational preparedness of Army Strategic Forces, which was reflected by proficient handling of Weapon System in the field and achievement of operational and technical objectives. He also appreciated the scientists and engineers for their contributions towards enhancement of Pakistan’s strategic capability.

The President, Prime Minister of Pakistan, CJCSC and Services Chiefs congratulated the participating troops, scientists and engineers on successful conduct of training launch.

There are a number of useful items in this September India statement, but here’s the portion about the FMCT:

India has supported the immediate commencement of negotiations in the CD on a Fissile Material Cutoff Treaty (FMCT) on the basis of CD/1299 and the mandate contained therein, which remains the most suitable basis for negotiations.

This note from India concerning New Delhi’s implementation of UNSCR 1540 contains some useful information about India’s export controls. This paragraph is a decent example:

Here’s an assessment of the India 123 from former Indian official D.B. Venkatesh Varma

So today, we have a nuclear deal where our civilian programme is not short of nuclear fuel and our weapons programme is proceeding merrily forward. Overall it has been a success. We got our cake and we ate it too…

This U.S. Food for Thought paper provides some insight into the workings of the CD.

This LRB piece mentions the British magazine Protect and Survive Monthly, which “was mainly a collection of adverts for Geiger counters and shelters with names like the Mole and the Egg.” Published between ~1981 and 86, the magazine had 12,000 subscribers.

According to the BBC, “[o]ne advert even promoted a wine club, with vintages you could keep in your shelter. As one article put it, ‘You don’t want to be caught in a queue at the supermarket when the bomb drops! ‘ “

Or so it seems. I think both the question and the government response conflate “nuclear state” with “nuclear weapon state”

This 1954 Preliminary Proposal for an International Organization to Further the Peaceful Uses of Atomic Energy contains some proposed names:

This past June, Pakistan’s Defense Minister Khawaja Muhammad Asif gave an interview in which he commented on Islamabad’s nuclear weapons program:

Our nuclear capability, or nuclear assets, they are not for any jingoistic or hostile intentions. If you observe, since we attained nuclear capability, the skirmishes, the wars, the battles between India and Pakistan have not escalated the way they escalated way back in 1965, and 1948, and then 1971. These were large-scale wars between India and Pakistan. We have had some sort of tension between India and Pakistan, but they are short-lived tensions, military tensions or border tensions.

So, I think it’s something which underwrites our security, it’s not for any hostile—no, absolutely no, absolutely not. India had become a nuclear power. And we were compelled not to be gobbled by India over the years or over the decades. This is something which underwrites the peace in our region and to a great extent, our security. Otherwise, we have absolutely no intentions. Absolutely no.

It is a program which is certified by the IAEA [International Atomic Energy Agency] and even as recently as a month back, there was a statement from the IAEA that all the standards—even from the United States—that our program is safe. So, this is something which the regional countries, our neighbors or even elsewhere, despite the fact that we have terrorist activities, which was a byproduct of a foreign war in the ’80s and after 9/11, that’s the byproduct of that war that threatened our internal security in so many ways, but we contained everything with conventional forces and conventional weapons.

And we will not, never, never, ever cross that threshold. That is something that just guarantees our independence

A few weeks ago, I noticed something in the 2023 Compliance Report. The report mentions China’s 2000 commitment to refrain from assisting “in any way, any country in the development of ballistic missiles that can be used to deliver nuclear weapons (i.e., missiles capable of delivering a payload of at least 500 kilograms to a distance of at least 300 kilometers),”

The report then includes this bit:

Based on information included in the classified Annex, the United States will no longer report on the PRC’s adherence to its 2000 commitment in future Compliance Reports.

Not sure what that’s about.