31.   France set off an underground nuclear test blast in the South Pacific on Wednesday, the fifth in a series since September that aroused worldwide protests.

32.   French President Jacques Chirac has said that France needs the test blasts to develop computer simulations of explosions, making further testing unnecessary.

33.   German Chancellor Helmut Kohl condemned the Pakistani test blasts but said he opposes economic sanctions against Pakistan and India because experience shows they do not work.

34.   Greenpeace pressed China to renounce any further test blasts.

35.   If Pakistan, which also has not signed the Non-Proliferation Treaty, stages a test blast, India will not respond, the senior official said.

36.   Nuclear testing by the Chinese and the French, who exploded a test blast in the South Pacific on Tuesday, has been the target of frequent demonstrations.

37.   Pakistan quickly responded with nuclear test blasts of its own.

38.   Pakistan warned archrival India on Sunday not to set off a nuclear test blast, saying that would jeopardize peace and stability in South Asia.

39.   One of the motivations was to better understand the effects of radioactive fallout from nuclear test blasts in the Pacific and in the southwestern United States.

40.   Relations between the two nations had cooled after France carried out a series of nuclear test blasts in the South Pacific through January this year.