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NPT PrepCom 2003: Preview & Analysis

Incentives, Obligations And Enforcement: Does the NPT Meet its States Parties' Needs?

By Rebecca Johnson

Introduction

The 187 states parties to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) will be holding their second Preparatory Committee (PrepCom) meeting for the 2005 Review Conference in Geneva, April 28 to May 9, 2003.¹ The NPT, which was extended indefinitely in 1995, faces some very serious challenges - even threats - that could result in its rather early demise unless great care is taken to address its limitations. The nuclear programmes of Iraq and North Korea clearly illustrate the corrosive dangers that states parties need to address more comprehensively. Yet, when Kim Jong Il's government, in January this year, announced for the second time that North Korea intended to pull out of the NPT, it was left to the United States, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Board of Governors or the United Nations Security Council to respond. NPT states parties, as such, have no voice or representation except at the five-yearly review conferences.

Whether the tough challenges outlined below succeed in undermining the treaty will ultimately depend on whether states parties continue to view the NPT as meeting their security needs and interests as the complex geopolitical environment evolves in the 21st century. That in turn may require that the non-proliferation regime is brought more fully up to date, particularly in respect of three core elements: incentives; reciprocal obligations; and enforcement.

As things stand, the second PrepCom will no doubt go through the motions of a general debate and cluster debates, and then the Chair, Ambassador László Molnár of Hungary, will do his best to present the tenor of the concerns back to the states parties in his "factual summary". The 1998 second PrepCom in Geneva was a very rough ride and ended in a late night deadlock. Depending on the level of heat surrounding issues such as the Middle East, Iraq or North Korea, many anticipate that the 2003 PrepCom will also be difficult. On the other hand, many delegations will be keen to demonstrate that the NPT and non-proliferation regime remain strong and effective, so will seek a balance between addressing the hard issues of compliance and nuclear disarmament and reinforcing the credibility of the review process. It is difficult to gauge what effect the war on Iraq will have on the mood and conduct of the PrepCom. Much depends on what has happened by then. Rhetoric may fly, but it may well be too complex or unfinished an international situation to play a measurable role at the time.

NPT watchers will count up the number of times that certain issues are raised (and the strength of the diplomatic language employed): North Korea's announced defection; the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), opened for signature in 1996 but yet to enter into force; the 1995 Resolution on the Middle East and Israel's nuclear weapons; Iraq; universality; security assurances; new and emerging nuclear doctrines; the unequivocal undertaking to achieve the elimination of nuclear arsenals; and the 13 Steps on nuclear disarmament unanimously agreed at the 2000 Review Conference². Should the PrepCom aim for a consensus statement on North Korea - and is that feasible, given the difficulties the non-aligned states experienced when they failed to get agreement on something similar earlier in the year? How far will some states push for greater accountability, as Canada, South Africa, and others did last year? How will the issue of reporting, which nearly derailed the first PrepCom, be handled?³ Will the cluster debates be more "interactive", as called for by the New Agenda Coalition⁴ and others, and what will that mean in practice? Will delegations depart from current practice to ask questions about other states' reports or statements, and if so, will the questioned delegations reply substantively or seek to avoid interaction?

This essay does not aim to discuss or predict what will happen at the PrepCom or offer advice on how it should be approached. My aim, rather, is to look beyond and anticipate some of the issues that will need to be on the table for decision in 2005 - and therefore need to begin to be considered and discussed now. Multilateralism and arms control are both under threat, principally from the rise to power in the United States of a neo-conservative analysis that portrays international treaties and alliances as "vitality sapping, virility constraining and option closing" encumbrances for a country that believes it has the military and economic dominance and god-given right to do as it pleases.⁵ Multilateralism, arms control and the NPT in particular are also weakened by countries which deliberately violate their obligations, like Iraq; play political games with their adherence, like North Korea; unreasonably delay implementing their specific obligations, like the nuclear-weapon states (NWS) over disarmament, and those states parties which have not yet concluded safeguards agreements or Additional Protocols with the IAEA⁶. countries that hedge their bets on future nuclear options, as a growing number of countries are believed to be doing, also put the long term effectiveness of multilateral arms control at risk.

It is undeniable that in the interests of wider goals of international security and stability, treaties constrain the options available to individual states. The appeal of such treaties is that they meet national security needs better than the alternative, which may be unbridled proliferation or ruinously expensive arms racing, destruction of the environment and so on. In taking into account the current serious challenges to the non-proliferation regime and looking towards 2005, states parties need to consider what they can do to ensure that the NPT reflects and meets the security needs of its members.

Challenges to the Non-Proliferation Regime

The non-proliferation regime operates within a wider international security environment that has been undergoing upheaval and deep changes since the end of the Cold War. Yet, until recently, the major governments and most NGOs have failed to address these changes or adapt their approaches, structures and strategies to deal effectively with the different challenges. While US defence industries took the initiative to ensure future new markets⁷, the Clinton administration pursued arms control initiatives such as the CTBT, the Strategic Arms Reduction (START) process with Russia, and the indefinite extension of the NPT while trying to carry on a 'business as usual' approach to US security doctrine and policy, including nuclear policy, as exemplified by the 1994 Nuclear Posture Review (NPR).⁸ As a consequence, Clinton's foreign and arms control policies were essentially well meaning but incoherent.

On assuming office in January 2001, the administration of George W. Bush came prepared to address the post-Cold War relationship between foreign policy and US interests. But as its neoconservative leadership were more concerned with promoting their values and ensuring US business and defence industry interests and profits than enhancing security, the administration came up with what most of the rest of the world consider to be the wrong answers. According to the Bush understanding, it is not the acquisition and deployment of nuclear weapons that is the problem, but such capabilities in the hands of "evil folks".⁹ This flawed approach has done little to address, and much to exacerbate, five specific and interrelated problems of fundamental concern to NPT parties:

• The "D-3" (de facto) nuclear weapon possessors outside the NPT: India, Israel and Pakistan. Despite widespread international outrage over the nuclear weapon tests in India and Pakistan in May 1998, and notwithstanding the regular arguments and calls for a nuclear-weapon-free zone (NWFZ) or a zone free of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East, there appears to be a growing acceptance that universalisation of the treaty really means universalisation minus three. During the 2002 PrepCom, despite calls from the European Union and others for India and Pakistan to meet the requirements of UNSC 1172 (June 1998)¹⁰, the United States called only for "restraint", and for these non-NPT parties to "protect against the proliferation of technology and materials to others seeking nuclear weapons".¹¹
• The "W-3" wannabe nuclear weapon developers: Iraq, DPRK and Iran. As with the D-3, the motivations driving these three states are very different, and it is important to be wary of the kind of glib generalisations that have emanated from the elevation of a catchy soundbite ("axis of evil") into US policy. Iraq was proved to be a cheat when the extent of its clandestine nuclear programme was exposed after the first Gulf War in 1991; North Korea was shown to be in non-compliance with its IAEA safeguards agreements in 1993 and, most recently in 2002, has flagrantly defied the regime and announced its withdrawal from the NPT. Iran is included because, despite being cleared by IAEA inspections under the demonstrably inadequate INFCIRC/153 safeguards, there remain persistent and credible concerns. Since Saddam Hussein had shown how possible it was to develop a nuclear weapon programme while in apparent compliance with INFCIRC/153, Iran would need to comply fully with the much wider inspections enshrined in the IAEA's Additional Protocol (INFCIRC/540 - see endnote 5) if it wanted to convince the world that it truly has no nuclear weapon ambitions or programme.

• Failure of the nuclear-weapon states to comply with their Article VI obligations on nuclear disarmament. Three aspects are particularly relevant here:-

  (i) The CTBT. While four of the NWS have ratified, the US Senate rejected ratification in 1999 and the Bush administration has repeatedly proclaimed that it "does not support the CTBT."¹² As an aspiration enshrined in the NPT's preamble, and a priority pledge in the 1995 Principles and Objectives and the 2000 Final Document, the test ban is integral to the credibility of the NPT. The CTBT was widely understood to have been a political (if not legal) condition of indefinite extension in 1995, so discussion in the United States that if Bush gets a second term in 2004 he is likely to resume nuclear testing for new warheads (potentially encompassing low yield, deep penetrating or missile-defence-related purposes) is particularly destabilising for the NPT regime.

  (ii) An apparent reinterpretation of, or reneging on, the NPT agreements, especially the plan of action on nuclear disarmament (also called the '13 steps') by some of the nuclear-weapon states. At the 2002 PrepCom, the United States announced that it only "generally agrees" with the conclusions of the 2000 NPT Review Conference and "no longer support[s] some of the Article VI conclusions in the Final Document from the 2000 NPT Review Conference".¹³ France, too, has caused concern by openly disregarding the fact that the 2000 Final Document delinked the unequivocal undertaking to eliminate nuclear arsenals from the more distant aspiration, also contained in Article VI, of general and complete disarmament.¹⁴

  (iii) Re-evaluation of the role of nuclear weapons and the promulgation of new nuclear doctrines and dependencies that may result in the erosion of the taboo on nuclear weapon use. Such concerns are based on the resurgence of political discussion in the United States of the need to develop more 'usable' tactical, mini or micro nuclear weapons, and statements by the US and UK linking their nuclear weapons with the countering of biological and chemical weapons threats, viewed by many as incompatible with the security assurances they have given to NPT parties.¹⁵

• Regional security considerations for NPT parties with nuclear weapon possessors (P-5 or D-3), wannabes or potential proliferators in their region. Whether we like it or not, and regardless of whether the rationalisations are convincing, it appears that for a number of key governments nuclear weapons are increasing in their political value. The reasons for such states retaining or seeking to acquire nuclear weapons are complex, but the "knock-on" effects for neighbouring countries may be heightened regional insecurity, perhaps sufficient to cause some non-nuclear-weapon states to reconsider the value of the NPT for their security. Although membership of the NPT is at an unprecedented high, the regime will lose credibility in security terms if more states adopt the insurance policy of manipulating the Article IV provisions - the right of access to nuclear technology for peaceful purposes - to hedge their bets.
• Loose nukes and inadequately safeguarded bomb materials. This covers not only accidents and access to materials capable of causing a nuclear explosion, but also the radiologically destructive 'dirty bomb' dangers. Traditionally perceived as a safety and security problem, this challenge has been taken more seriously, for obvious reasons, post-9/11. In fact, the question goes to the heart of the Article IV incentive trade-off, as was tacitly acknowledged when the 2002 PrepCom allocated special time for discussing the safety and security of the nuclear fuel cycle.

These are the major real-world challenges to the NPT, which may be profoundly affected by the lessons learned (for good or ill) from the war on Iraq, continuing at the time of writing. These challenges relate fundamentally to security questions concerning the role and control of nuclear, chemical and biological weapons with regard to states, failed states and non-state actors. To address them, we must distinguish between the Non-Proliferation Treaty and the non-proliferation regime. The NPT was opened for signature in 1968, a time dominated by Cold War politics and perspectives. The Treaty and its review process now need to be evaluated in light of the wider contemporary debate over the comparative uses and limitations of cooperative multilateralism, coercive unilateralism and regional agreements and confidence-building. As 1995 and 2000 demonstrated, the NPT is able to respond to changing conditions and, by agreement of its states parties, can be equipped with new tools to increase its effectiveness and implementation.

Updating the Objectives and Commitments

It is usual to think of the NPT as comprising two kinds of bargain: in exchange for foregoing nuclear weapons, the non-nuclear-weapon states (NNWS) were promised 'good faith' progress to achieve nuclear disarmament and support to enable them to benefit from the non-military uses of nuclear energy. If the NPT is to remain a cornerstone of international security, its core and reciprocal obligations, incentives and enforcement powers need to be brought into the 21st century.

Incentives

The principal incentives for the NNWS in the NPT are found in Article IV, which enshrined the "inalienable right" of parties "to develop research, production and use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes", and Article VI, on pursuing nuclear disarmament. A further important incentive was the positive and negative security assurances provided by the defined NWS to the NNWS parties in 1968, 1978 and updated in 1995, even though the positive assurance was extremely limited and the negative security assurance (NSA) was hedged with Cold War conditions.¹⁶ Article VII of the treaty promoted the right of states to conclude regional NWFZs. In general, the NWS have agreed more far-reaching, unconditional negative security assurances in relation to the NWFZ.¹⁷

Faced with the D-3, W-3 and the possible reassessment by other countries of how well the treaty meets their security needs, NPT parties may need to consider whether better, different or more attractive and useful incentives could help to keep wavering states on board or might even, in the future, entice the three hold-outs to join. Two important kinds of incentives need to be reconsidered: meeting energy and development needs, and meeting security needs.

Meeting Energy Needs

Some NNWS treat Article IV as if it promised unhampered technology exchange and support for nuclear energy programmes, although this interpretation goes rather further than the treaty text. Back in the 1960s, Article IV appeared very attractive, as nuclear energy appeared to offer a relatively cheap, safe, and environmentally clean energy resource (by comparison with acid-rain-producing coal, ubiquitous at the time). This vision, however, has comprehensively, and sometimes disastrously, failed to materialise.¹⁸ The problems of radioactive waste remain essentially unsolved. Safety concerns caused by the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl accidents have been exacerbated by post 9/11 recognition of the vulnerability of nuclear power plants to terrorist attack. In effect, a nuclear power plant is a massive 'dirty bomb' waiting to be detonated by the next unscrupulous terrorist equipped with a fuel-filled passenger plane.

These considerations, and the persistent accidents and problems that have beset the nuclear programmes of developed countries like Britain and Japan, contain worrying lessons for the safety and security of nuclear power facilities in less developed countries, where more reliable and accessible energy resources are so desperately needed. Even when the deleterious climate change effects of fossil-fuel emissions are factored in, nuclear energy has too many problems to pose as a sensible alternative.

Moreover, the persistent suspicions against Iran are significantly based on Western views that its case for developing nuclear energy is so unconvincing that it must harbour the real objective of using Article IV to advance its nuclear weapon programme as far as possible without detection or censure. Such a view may well be true, but it is also very revealing of the perceivers' own lack of confidence in the economic and energy arguments for developing nuclear power in the 21st century. As Margaret Thatcher's government found when it privatised the UK energy industry, if the subsidies and the politics that have supported nuclear power programmes in most countries are stripped away, nuclear energy is exposed as a source of vulnerability and an unattractive investment. It hardly makes sense, unless a country wishes to take out an insurance policy that would provide it with the basis for a nuclear weapon option at some time in the future, should its political or security environment change.

In light of these drawbacks and difficulties, Article IV is far from being an effective incentive to keep states parties in the regime. Yet developing countries have growing energy needs. They require assistance, support, technology transfers and exchanges to help them develop energy resources to meet their people's needs and aspirations. Sustainable energy approaches, including solar, wave and wind power, that were derided a decade ago are looking more and more attractive, but for them to come close to meeting global needs, there must be a more coherent international approach to provide the framework for investment, subsidies and technology exchange to enable sustainable, renewable sources of energy to become economically and internationally viable on a wide scale.

Problems with the safety and security of the nuclear fuel cycle are increasingly recognised as the purview of the NPT, as illustrated by extra time devoted to this issue at the PrepCom in 2002, but states parties should also give more thought to whether they can construct a mechanism to meet states' real and serious energy needs, either under the auspices of the treaty or in parallel.

Meeting Security Needs: Nuclear Disarmament

Where Article IV addressed energy and developmental needs, Article VI and NSA address security concerns. Neither has been adequate. Thirty-five years after the NPT was concluded, the P-5 are still acting as though the disarmament obligation was totally open-ended and voluntary. Look, say the best of them, we are complying, but in our own time (and it's very rude of you to doubt this and put pressure on us to report to you on what we are doing). The Bush administration takes a selective and more openly non-compliant approach these days. The CTBT: "We're not for that"; the unequivocal undertaking to eliminate nuclear arsenals agreed by the United States in 2000: "We're not for that either."¹⁹ And, sadly, their actions speak even louder than these words.

Unlike the NWS' safeguards agreements, Article VI was not intended to be optional or voluntary. In tacit acknowledgement of this, and because the non-proliferation regime is in their interests, the NWS have tended to pay more attention (or at least lip-service) to their disarmament obligations when they have reason to be concerned about the NPT's health and safety. The risks associated with the 1995 extension decision wonderfully concentrated the NWS' minds. Would they have negotiated a CTBT without it? Would they have agreed the Principles and Objectives and strengthened review process in 1995 if they had not desired to achieve indefinite extension without a vote? Again in 2000, there was a confluence of concerns about regional security and proliferation in key areas like the Middle East and South Asia and a perceived need to assert the credibility of the non-proliferation regime following the nuclear tests of India and Pakistan. These concerns acted as a positive pressure on the NWS to negotiate with the New Agenda Coalition on a disarmament plan of action, which was incorporated into a convincing consensus Final Document.

For far too long, the NWS sheltered behind the vagueness of Article VI's wording, and continued with vertical proliferation and a multitude of prevarications. The vagueness has now been replaced by a very specific plan of principles, steps and measures laid out in 1995 and negotiated in detail and agreed in 2000. Yet the NWS behave as if there is still doubt about their disarmament obligations and the expectations of their non-nuclear partners in the non-proliferation regime.

As an incentive, nuclear disarmament was an important commitment in 1968 and could be an extremely powerful tool to enable the NPT to play its proper role in eliminating nuclear dangers in the future. Moreover, it is arguably the only means by which universality can now be broached, at least as far as India and Pakistan are concerned. Whatever the reasons underlying India's decision to test and go overtly nuclear in 1998 (and I, like many others, am sceptical whether national security was the primary driver), there is a compelling logic to the security dilemma frequently put forward by India when it renews its calls for a Nuclear Weapon Convention: that if some countries have nuclear weapons, India must have them, but overall, its security would be best served by universal nuclear disarmament.²⁰

No-one is underestimating the complexities of disarmament and the extraordinary intrusiveness and monitoring that will be necessary to ensure that there are no loose nukes or weapon-usable stockpiles left out of the processes of control and elimination, but it is clear from recent events that the NPT risks becoming destabilised if more countries follow the logic of India's position. Echoes are already being heard from North Asia to the Middle East. Therefore, if non-proliferation is to play a long term role in 21st century security, the elimination of nuclear dangers requires systematic and progressive disarmament.

Security Against The Use Of Nuclear Weapons

In light of the war on Iraq and statements from British and American officials linking nuclear responses to potential chemical and biological threats²¹, it is likely that the role and adequacy of security assurances will again become a priority at the 2003 NPT PrepCom. In general, the non-aligned states demand that legally binding, unconditional negative security assurances should be provided as a right because the non-nuclear NPT parties have voluntarily abjured the option to arm themselves with nuclear weapons.

For a regime seeking to attract new adherents, such an approach made a lot of sense, but may now need to be rethought. India sought security assurances after China went nuclear. In the immediate aftermath of India's nuclear tests in 1998, security assurances were part of the package that Pakistan tried to obtain as the price for not conducting its own tests. Just a few months ago, even as it announced its withdrawal from the NPT, North Korea tried to bargain for some sort of guarantee from the Bush administration that the United States would not attack. In all three cases, the assurances that were sought were withheld, and the states in question duly took their further steps towards nuclear weapons acquisition.

While it may be argued that they would have done so in any case, it is worth looking again at the role of security assurances, not only to reassure NPT parties, but as an incentive to draw opt-out or hold-out states closer into the regime. For NSA to provide real security reassurance sufficient to influence a state's decision about whether to seek to acquire nuclear weapons, we need to move away from the cynical assumption that these are purely for rhetorical flourish, to be overtaken in the event of actual hostilities. In this regard, the veiled (and not so veiled) threats and verbal sleights of hand with which senior US and British officials and politicians have recently indulged themselves run the dangerous risk of discrediting security assurances altogether, increasing the pressure on some governments to establish guarantees of their own.

Enforcement

In the treaty text, enforcement is left to Article III, of which paragraphs 1, 3 and 4 are incumbent only on the non-nuclear states parties. If interpreted in terms only of the INFCIRC/153 safeguards, Article III is demonstrably inadequate. For there to be any confidence in the NPT's ability to enforce the obligations contained in Article II, adherence to the Additional Protocol needs to be made mandatory. This would require a decision of states parties, but no amendment to the treaty text as such.

Not part of the NPT text per se, but an essential tool of the non-proliferation regime nonetheless, are export and technology controls. However, these need to be more consistently and transparently applied. They must be fair and should not be used for commercial advantage or to convey favouritism, approval or disapproval of certain states for political reasons other than to prevent the acquisition of nuclear weapons or capabilities. If export controls appear in contradiction to Article IV, as some states claim, it is Article IV's promotion of energy and commerce based on the materials and technology of a weapon of mass destruction that is the problem, not anti-proliferation controls on the weapons components and technologies.

Even if the Additional Protocol became mandatory for NPT parties and export controls were more effectively and openly administered, a major enforcement challenge would remain. The treaty's lack of an implementing authority leaves states parties without an effective, representative voice to address incidents or suspicions of withdrawal or non-compliance. In practice, much of the onus falls on the IAEA Board of Governors, but that is problematic, since IAEA membership is different from NPT membership and the IAEA is charged with other tasks that are not necessarily conducive to non-proliferation.

The role of the three NPT depositaries - Russia, the United States and Britain - is an anachronism, and enforcement decisions cannot be entrusted to them. In practice, such decisions are frequently left to the United States, which determines its own policy that may (or may not) include other key states, as in the case of North Korea. Alternatively, as evidenced in the series of crisis meetings following the South Asian nuclear tests in 1998, the P-5 may act in concert, but this can be confused and counter-productive.²² If viewed as acting in their capacity as NWS, their own poor record on compliance diminishes their moral authority, as India was quick to point out. If acting as the permanent members of the UN Security Council, the P-5 may have political authority, but have they thereby bypassed NPT states parties, and to whom are they accountable? Similar questions arise if the responsibility for responding to proliferation challenges or non-compliance is placed solely on the UN Secretary-General.

Within the NPT, the review process is an enforcement mechanism of sorts, but, even after being strengthened in 1995 and 2000, is it enough? Though meetings are now held almost every year, senior officials from some of the nuclear-weapon states have been at pains to emphasise that while the PrepComs serve as a platform for expressing national positions and concerns, only the quinquennial Review Conferences have any decision-making powers. If true, the PrepComs are very expensive talking shops; but such was clearly not the intention of the majority of those who supported the strengthening of the review process in 1995 and 2000. In the run-up to 2000, several ideas were floated on the need to consider a new decision-making body or mechanism to facilitate and take responsibility for enforcement and implementation on behalf of the NPT states parties. The Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs, Jayantha Dhanapala, raised the possibility of establishing a Secretariat. Ireland floated the idea of short, annual or ad hoc, meetings of states parties with plenipotentiary powers that could address proliferation threats and challenges as they arise (and not just once every five years).

During the 2000 Review Conference, the main emphasis was on making the 1995 agreements work; though some expressed interest in the institutional possibilities suggested by Dhanapala, Ireland and others, the idea of going beyond the review process had little traction at the time. The 2000 Conference demonstrated, beyond the expectations of even its most ardent strategists, what could be achieved using the strengthened review process and the Principles and Objectives. That very success, however, has exposed the structural and political limitations of the review process. Diplomatically, the Final Document has clearly defined the expectations, commitments and priorities relevant to compliance with and implementation of the NPT. But as noted above, some of the most important NPT parties have publicly and politically backed away from the agreements, again leaving the impression that they are optional, and not binding.

It is therefore necessary to put back on the table ideas for how NPT parties can be empowered to address in a timely and effective manner the proliferation challenges of the real world. Consideration should include one or more of the following:

• plenipotentiary meetings - not two-week talking shops but three-four days per year (or more as necessary) with a specific agenda reflecting current geopolitical proliferation priorities;
• an Executive Council that would meet periodically, with the power to call a full meeting of states parties if the need arises. Such a council, replacing the current role of the depositaries, could be delegated the authority and responsibility to work closely with the IAEA, the export control regimes, related treaty organisations (such as the CTBTO) and also the UN Security Council to monitor the implementation of the NPT and respond to non-compliance or other crises for the regime as they occur; and/or
• a Director-General, supported by a small Secretariat. Despite the claims of Vienna, it would probably be best for the regime if the Director-General and Secretariat were based at the UN in New York, close to the Department for Disarmament Affairs and the Security Council.

Conclusion

The strengthened review process is a major improvement on what was available before 1995, but recent developments illustrate that it still falls short of providing NPT parties with the timely authority and accountability they need to ensure that the non-proliferation regime can address proliferation challenges and enforce the treaty's provisions effectively and coherently.

The NPT is the cornerstone of nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament, but it is not indestructible. This essay has argued that we need to offer more relevant incentives and more convincing enforcement mechanisms to keep states in the NPT, create the conditions to enable the hold-outs to come on board and, potentially, to address nuclear dangers posed by non-state actors. While it is not necessary for the incentives or compliance mechanisms to be provided under the treaty itself, they need to be addressed as part of the non-proliferation regime if there is to be any hope of maintaining a credible international approach to preventing nuclear weapons acquisition and use.

If failed states contribute to the causes of terrorism, it is important to look at the security-building and support that could be provided through international exchange and aid in order to help countries deal with poverty, water and environmental resources, and transboundary security threats such as epidemics, crime, and the smuggling of arms, drugs and people. If illicit access to bomb making materials is a threat to international security, then we need to deal more intelligently with the problems of the licit nuclear fuel cycle.

States parties are the sovereign decision-making power for the NPT, but for the NPT to be a sustainable basis for international efforts against nuclear weapons, they require better mechanisms to help them take responsibility for how it is implemented. If this is not possible under the review process as enhanced in 1995 and 2000, NPT parties in 2005 should be prepared to think again.

Notes and References

1. With Cuba's recent accession to the NPT, only three of the 191 UN member states - India, Israel and Pakistan - remain outside the treaty at the time of writing. On January 10, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) announced its intention to withdraw from the treaty. Under the terms of Article X, a withdrawal - which has never before occurred - takes place three months after the notice of intent is served: in this case, April 10. There is, however, a fierce political dispute and legal controversy surrounding the country's status in the treaty, not least because of its clear violations of the accord prior to April 10. For its part - in a position supported by no other state - North Korea argues that it left the treaty on January 11, due to the three-months-less-a-day it served an earlier notice of withdrawal (in 1993). See this issue's News Review for more detail on the UN Security Council's inconclusive deliberations on the question and related comment and analysis.

2. For a review of the 2000 NPT Review Conference, including the full text of the 13-step 'Programme of Action on Nuclear Disarmament', see Rebecca Johnson, The 2000 NPT Review Conference: a Delicate, Hard-Won Compromise, Disarmament Diplomacy No. 46 (May 2000).

3. For more detail on the first PrepCom, held in New York, April 8-19, 2002, see Rebecca Johnson, The 2002 PrepCom: Papering Over the Cracks? Disarmament Diplomacy 64 (May/June 2002); and William C. Potter, Mary Beth Nikitin and Tariq Rauf, Ambassador Henrik Salander on the 2002 NPT Preparatory Committee, The Nonproliferation Review 9 (Summer 2002).

4. The New Agenda Coalition, formed in June 1998, consists of Brazil, Egypt, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa and Sweden.

5. Will Hutton, "The tragedy of this unequal partnership", The Observer, March 30, 2003.

6. On March 17, IAEA Director General Dr. Mohamed Elbaradei told the Agency's Board of Governors that "the number of safeguards agreements and additional protocols actually in force continues to be well below expectations. I regret to report again that 48 states have yet to fulfil their obligations under the NPT to bring safeguards agreements with the Agency into force, and that additional protocols have entered into force for only 29 states. As I have often stated, in states without safeguards agreements in force, the Agency cannot provide any non-proliferation assurances, and in states that do not have an additional protocol in force, similar to the situation prior to the Gulf War when we failed to uncover Iraq's clandestine nuclear programme, the assurance provided by the safeguards system remains limited with regard to the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities." 'Introductory Statement to the Board of Governors by IAEA Director General Dr. Mohamed ElBaradei, Vienna, 17 March, 2003', IAEA website, http://www.iaea.org.

7. Bruce Jackson, for example, a former Vice President of the Lockheed Martin Corporation, founded the "Committee on NATO" which pushed for the expansion of NATO to include former Eastern bloc countries, which would then have to buy Lockheed products to 'upgrade' and 'harmonise' their military forces as a condition of joining NATO. This same Bruce Jackson now runs the "Committee for the Liberation of Iraq", understood to have coordinated the 10 former Eastern-bloc members of NATO to support the US-UK position on war in Iraq, and no doubt looking forward to suitable contractual rewards in reconstruction and the restocking of arsenals. See Private Eye No 1076 (March 21 - April 3, 2003), p 7.

8. US Nuclear Posture Review (NPR), approved by President Bill Clinton in a Presidential Decision Directive (PDD) on September 18, 1994, PPD/NSC-30. For a useful summary, see the Federation of American Scientists website, http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/pdd30.htm.

9. For a thought-provoking analysis of the flawed strategy of Bush's "non-proliferation radicals", see George Perkovich, "Bush's Nuclear Revolution: A Regime Change in Non-proliferation", Foreign Affairs (March/April 2003).

10. Statement by Carlos Miranda, ambassador of Spain to the Conference on Disarmament on behalf of the European Union, at the first session of the Preparatory Committee Meeting for the 2005 NPT Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, April 8, 2002.

11. Statement by Ambassador Normal A. Wulf, representative of the United States of America, to the first session of the Preparatory Committee Meeting for the 2005 NPT Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, April 8, 2002.

12. Fiona Simpson, Anxiety, Hope and Cynicism: the 2002 UN First Committee, Disarmament Diplomacy 68 (December 2002/January 2003). The US also shocked NPT parties, and especially its own allies, by boycotting the Second Conference on Facilitating the Entry into Force of the CTBT in November 2001. See Rebecca Johnson, Boycotts and Blandishments: Making the CTBT Visible, Disarmament Diplomacy 61 (October/November 2001).

13. See: Statement by Ambassador Norman A. Wulf, representative of the United States of America, to the first session of the Preparatory Committee Meeting for the 2005 NPT Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, April 8, 2002; and Statement by Ambassador Eric M. Javits, permanent representative of the United States of America to the Conference on Disarmament, Geneva, delivered to the NPT PrepCom, Article VI "special time", April 11, 2002.

14. Article VI reads in full: "Each of the parties to the Treaty undertakes to pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to nuclear disarmament, and on a treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control."

15. See Tanya Ogilvie-White and John Simpson, "The NPT and its 2003 PrepCom Session: A Regime in Need of Intensive Care", The Nonproliferation Review (Spring 2003).

16. The US formula, for example, as set out in a declaration by President Bill Clinton on April 5, 1995, shortly before the opening of the NPT Review and Extension Conference, reads as follows: "The United States reaffirms that it will not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states parties to the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons except in the case of an invasion or any other attack on the United States, its territories, its armed forces or other troops, its allies, or on a state towards which it has a security commitment, carried out or sustained by such a non-nuclear-weapon state in association or alliance with a nuclear-weapon state." Similar formulas were concurrently set out by Russia, France and the UK. China is the only NWS to have declared a policy of no first use of nuclear weapons, a position constituting an unconditional - if still legally non-binding - security assurance of the non-use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states. The currently definitive UN document on the issue is Security Council resolution 984, adopted unanimously on April 11, 1995, and taking note "of the statements made by each of the nuclear-weapon states…in which they give security assurances against the use of nuclear weapons to non-nuclear-weapon states that are parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons".

17. Four nuclear-weapon-free zones have so far been concluded: the 1995 Treaty on the Southeast Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (Bangkok) Treaty, which entered into force in 1997; the 1996 African Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (Pelindaba) Treaty, yet to enter into force; the 1985 South Pacific Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (Rarotonga) Treaty, which entered into force in 1986; and the 1967 Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean (Tlatelolco) Treaty, which entered into force for each government individually. All these treaties include protocols to be signed by the NWS, setting out their commitments and responsibilities, and stipulating security assurances to be offered to states parties. These protocols vary in their specifics; in the case of the Bangkok Treaty, the NWS have so far balked at the scope of the provisions involved, particularly with regard to the extension of the zone's area beyond territorial waters. A Central Asian Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone is currently reported to be nearing completion. In addition, the provisions of the 1959 Antarctic Treaty (entry-into-force, 1961) establishes a nuclear-weapon-free zone in that continent.

18. This negative verdict on the value of nuclear energy for power generation needs, of course, to be distinguished from nuclear technology for other peaceful uses, such as medicine, which have different economic and safety considerations and are much less vulnerable to abuse by proliferators or terrorists.

19. Bush administration official quoted in Perkovich, op.cit., p 7.

20. Acknowledging the logic of India's argument does not mean that I accept it as legitimate. Indeed, India's proposals have long served its nuclear policies, focussing on use rather than possession.

21. See for example, Andy Oppenheimer, "Her Majesty's new nukes?", Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (March/April 2003), pp 16-18.

22. For extensive coverage of the diplomatic response to the May 1998 India/Pakistan tests, including statements and documents by the P-5 and G-8, see 'South Asia Nuclear Crisis: Statements and Developments, June-September 1998', Acronym Institute website, http://www.acronym.org.uk/sasia/sasia2.htm. See also Disarmament Diplomacy, No. 26 (May 1998), No. 27 (June 1998) and No. 29 (July 1998).

Rebecca Johnson is Executive Editor and Publisher of Disarmament Diplomacy. This is an expanded version of the paper she presented to the Workshop on "Challenges facing the Nuclear Nonproliferation Regime", hosted by the Mountbatten Centre for International Studies and the Center for Nonproliferation Studies, Monterey Institute, in Annecy, March 14-15, 2003.

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