March 19, 1998

President William J. Clinton
The White House
1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, NW
Washington, DC 20500

Dear Mr. President:

We are writing to urge you in the strongest possible terms to terminate implementation of the U.S./China Nuclear Cooperation Agreement.

China's long-standing failure to live up to its nonproliferation promises is well-known. In spite of this, on January 12, 1998, you certified to the U.S. Congress that you had received "clear and u nequivocal assurances to the United States that it is not assisting and will not assist any non-nuclear weapon state, either directly or indirectly, in acquiring nuclear explosive devices or the material and components for such devices."

Press reports indicate that less than one month after you submitted these pledges to Congress, the state-run Chinese Nuclear Energy Industry Corp. was found to be planning a sale of large quantities of anhydrous hydrogen fluoride (AHF), a chemical used to produce weapons grade uranium, to a nuclear research center in Iran.

While the assurances you received from China may have been 'clear and unequivocal,' the reality is that China's intentions were clearly and unequivocally to continue to provide nuclear weapons technology to countries such as Iran. We urge you to terminate implementation of the U.S./China Nuclear Cooperation Agreement immediately.

Sincerely,

(signed)

Edward J. Markey
Benjamin A. Gilman
Nancy Pelosi
Christopher Cox
Frank Pallone
Gerald Solomon
Peter A. DeFazio
Duncan Hunter
Nita Lowey
Curt Weldon
James Traficant
Dana Rohrbacher
John F. Tierney

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