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Sign no-first-use agreement now, Benazir tells India, Pak

Pakistan's Opposition leader Benazir Bhutto has called on Islamabad and India to sign a 'no-first-use' nuclear weapons agreement as a first step to prevent a full-blown arms race in South Asia, newspaper reports said today.

Bhutto said in a statement that Thursday's ''matching response by Pakistan to India's five nuclear tests on May 11 and 13 proved that both countries had achieved nuclear parity.''

Both are now not only equals but have equal potential to inflict damage beyond imagination on each other, the former prime minister said.

She accused India's ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party, and Nawaz Sharief's government of embarking upon a dangerous road of escalation.

Bhutto, who had earlier urged Sharief to detonate the nuclear device to even the score with India or step down, said South Asia could not afford a costly arms race, the result of which can only be further impoverishment.

UNI

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