US lawmaker introduces bill seeking CAATSA waiver for India

Washington: A top Republican Senator has introduced a legislation in the US Senate asking President Joe Biden to certify to the Congress that any QUAD country against whom they impose punitive CAATSA sanctions is not taking part in the national security related quadrilateral deliberations. Introduced by Republican senator Ted Cruz from Texas and co-sponsored by Senator Todd Young from Indiana and Marshall Roger from Kansas, also Republicans, for all practical purposes discourages the president from imposing the punitive provisions of Countering America’s Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) against India for buying the S-400 surface-to-air missile system from Russia. The bill was introduced in the United States Senate on 28 October and the text of the bill was not yet made public by the Congress till Monday morning. The Quad or Quadrilateral Security Dialogue comprises India, the US, Japan and Australia. President Biden had hosted the first in-person summit of the Quad grouping on 24 September at the White House. Read twice and referred to the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs for necessary action to ensure that the QUAD country against whom the US is seeking to impose CAATSA sanctions is not part of Quad deliberations on national security purposes. If passed by Congress, the bill in all likelihood would throw QUAD, an ambitious foreign policy project of the Biden Administration, into disarray if the US imposes CAATSA sanctions on India. While the headline and summary of the bill, which have been made public so far, does not mention India, it is the only QUAD country that faces CAATSA sanctions. The bill was introduced in the US Senate, a day after two powerful US Senators Mark Warner and John Cornyn —urged Biden not to impose provisions of CAATSA against India urging him to grant a national interest waiver to India as provided under CAATSA as this is in America’s national security interest. We strongly encourage you to grant a CAATSA waiver to India for its planned purchase of the S-400 Triumf surface-to-air missile system. In cases where granting a waiver would advance the national security interests of the US, this waiver authority, as written into the law by Congress, allows the President additional discretion in applying sanctions, the two Senators wrote. Warner is Chairman of the Senate Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, and Cornyn Senate Minority Whip for the GOP. Both are co-chairs of the Senate India caucus, the only country specific caucus in the US Senate. We share your concerns regarding the purchase and the continued Indian integration of Russian equipment, even with these declining sales. We would encourage your administration to continue reinforcing this concern to Indian officials, and engaging with them constructively to continue supporting alternatives to their purchasing Russian equipment, they wrote. In October 2018, India signed a $5 billion deal with Russia to buy five units of the S-400 air defence missile systems, notwithstanding warning from the then Trump administration that going ahead with the contract may trigger US sanctions under CAATSA. The S-400 is known as Russia’s most advanced long-range surface-to-air missile defence system. CAATSA is a tough US law which authorises the administration to impose sanctions on countries that purchase major defence hardware from Russia in response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014 and its alleged meddling in the 2016 US presidential elections.