US-Saudi Civilian Nuclear Deal Raises Proliferation Concerns

A deal between the United States and Saudi Arabia to equip the kingdom with a civilian nuclear programme has provoked a flood of questions about the risks of nuclear proliferation.

Although the text has not been made public, US media has reported the agreement would allow Washington to export technology without the usual safeguards preventing future military use.

Bilateral cooperation agreements signed by the United States are generally subject to safeguards against proliferation, sometimes obliging the partner country not to enrich uranium domestically.

In Riyadh's case, this does not seem to be the case, although the deal has yet to be approved by Congress and there is no word from Saudi Arabia on US President Donald Trump's announcement that he would condition the agreement on Riyadh normalising ties with Israel.

Trump said Thursday there would be "no enrichment of material" in Saudi Arabia after the Wall Street Journal reported a provision that could allow US companies to build an enrichment facility there.

"If Riyadh had wanted to just have US backing for a civilian program, it would have done so years ago... the goal is to get US support for a deal that doesn't fully exclude a pathway" to a weapons program, analyst Michael Horowitz wrote, in a post on X.

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio has stressed there are safeguards against proliferation.

"This is destabilising... because it sends a message of an American double standard," Heloise Fayet, a specialist at French research centre IFRI told AFP.

This potential double standard points most obviously at Iran, which the US and Israel attacked at the end of February, in part citing the goal of preventing Tehran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

Iran has long denied seeking a weapon and defended its right to enrich uranium for nuclear energy.

Washington "can hardly emphasise its desire to maintain a nuclear counter-proliferation policy on the one hand and, on the other, accept such a deal with the Saudis," David Khalfa, a Middle East specialist at the Paris-based Jean-Jaures Foundation think tank, told AFP.

"Saudi Arabia is not supposed to be an exception" otherwise "the entire security architecture built since 1945 collapses," he said.

For Fayet, the US is sacrificing its non-proliferation role "on the altar of profitability and a good Saudi-American relationship".

"This appears to be a way for the United States to seek forgiveness" for the impact of its war with Iran, which has led to reprisals against Gulf states.

For Rosemary Kelanic of the Washington-based think tank Defense Priorities, writing on X, potentially giving Saudi Arabia enrichment capabilities means giving them "huge leverage to extract US security guarantees down the road by threatening to obtain nuclear weapons".

But some observers see these concerns being trumped by America's ambition to counter Chinese influence.

"The credibility of the US security umbrella has weakened" since the war against Iran, and the Gulf monarchies are diversifying their partnerships, Trita Parsi of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, a US think tank, wrote on Substack.

"Washington had to offer substantially more to try to keep Saudi from drifting further toward China, while getting substantially less in return."