By Gurmukh Singh

Toronto, Jun 30 (IANS): India has the potential to become Canada's biggest market for green energy exports and "India is not and should not be treated as a pariah state over its nuclear programme", a leading Canadian newspaper said in an editorial following Sunday's nuclear deal between the two countries.

The influential Globe and Mail in an editorial titled "Canada-India: these nukes are good nukes", the newspaper described the deal as "a long-awaited and welcome development".

The agreement will bring more prosperity and cleaner energy to India and help Canada become the clean energy superpower of the world, it said.

Calling the deal "an opportunity for Canada" in India's crowded nuclear market which the US, France and Russia have already entered and Japan and South Korea are set to enter, the editorial said: "Canada has advantages - a reliable uranium supply, a large diaspora supportive of greater ties - that these competitors lack.''

Referring to the bitter past when Canada broke off nuclear ties with India after its tests first in 1974 and then in 1998, the newspaper said: "India is not and should not be treated as a pariah state over its nuclear programme. It has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty, but it has also promised to never launch nuclear weapons first against an enemy (its nearest rival, Pakistan, also possesses nuclear capabilities).

"Its known capability to deploy nuclear weapons means, with the right safeguards in place, that Canada will not be an accomplice in further proliferation. India is also an assured and pluralistic democracy."

With two out of its five households without power and nuclear power accounting for just two percent of its electricity output, India should top Canada's list for clean energy exports if this country aspires to be a clean energy superpower, the editorial said.

"If Canada succeeds, then supplying India with cleaner electricity helps to bridge the gap between developed and developing countries on the question of who should pay to alleviate climate change," it said.

But despite striking the deal, the editorial said Canada needn't stop talking to India about non-proliferation.

"Indeed, with this agreement Canada has the opportunity to be more forceful in urging India to join the NPT's ranks."