Hashimoto urges Sharif not to conduct nuclear tests

TOKYO, May 27 Kyodo - Prime Minister Ryutaro Hashimoto urged Pakistani Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Wednesday not to conduct nuclear testing to match nuclear tests by India in mid-May. Hashimoto said he telephoned Sharif to renew Japan's request Pakistan exercise restraint and not carry out any nuclear tests. The call was prompted by news report saying Pakistan is ready to test. Sharif was quoted as telling Hashimoto he is under enormous public pressure to test because the Pakistani people feel that while Japan and the United States may have taken severe action against India, much of the international community did not. In a 30-minute conversation, Sharif was quoted as telling Hashimoto that India is taking ''an overbearing attitude'' toward Pakistan in their territorial dispute about Kashmir. In an interview with Japan Broadcasting Corp. (NHK), Hashimoto said he told Sharif Japan is making efforts to ask other nations for their cooperation to seek restraint on India. As part of such efforts, Hashimoto said Japan sent a senior Foreign Ministry official to the U.S. Hashimoto said in the interview, ''We must have Pakistan feel (safe) because this is concerned with security. ''I told Sharif we will do our utmost and I ask you to try to get the Pakistani people's consensus (not to carry out tests) and exercise self-control.'' Hashimoto also called on Pakistan and other countries that have not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty to change their positions and join global efforts to reduce and eliminate nuclear weapons. After India's nuclear tests May 11 and 13, Pakistan declared it was prepared and determined to ''counter the Indian threat'' and to ''respond appropriately to any provocation.'' Hashimoto sent a special envoy to Pakistan early last week to urge Sharif not to test. In meetings with Pakistani government representatives, envoy Seiichiro Noboru, chief of the Cabinet Councilors' Office on External Affairs, hinted Japan could impose economic sanctions on Pakistan if it conducts tests, as it has already done on India. Japan's sanctions against India include freezing new loans and aid, and shelving a plan to host a World Bank forum of donor nations to India on June 30 and July 1.