The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
The NPT Review Conference 2005: Acronym Special Coverage
Decisions and mysteries on Day 17: Committees and 'subsidiary
bodies' to start on Thursday
May 18, 2005
Rebecca Johnson
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The NPT Review Conference president, Ambassador Sergio Duarte of
Brazil, was finally able to bring the gavel down on agreement for
the three main committees (MC) and three subsidiary bodies (SB) to
meet, starting Thursday May 19th. In the morning plenary he warned
delegations that time was running out and if the committees were
not agreed today, then he would propose an alternative approach.
The plenary, at which further working papers were introduced by
Norway, China, Cuba, Qatar on behalf of the League of Arab States,
Canada, New Zealand on behalf of the New Agenda and in a further
statement representing a joint paper on article X with Australia,
as well as more from the G-10 was followed by interrupted informal
(closed) meetings and several caucuses of the groups (or rather the
NAM and Western group, since the declining Eastern European group
is often to be found spending caucus time in the lobby with
cigarettes, coffee and amusing conversation). Just before the
interpreters were due to shut up shop, we were treated to the final
five minute plenary at which the president's proposal was
accepted.
For a time the problem appeared to be time allocation, then it
was said to be difficulties over agreeing chairs for the subsidiary
bodies. In the end, the President's threat of a Plan B concentrated
the minds of hold-outs. Just before 5.30 pm, the closed meeting was
declared open and the throngs of NGOs and press waiting in the fug
of smoke outside Conference Room 4 were permitted to enter. The
president was already half way into his short speech as we
scrambled for seats and then the gavel came down. Apologies
therefore if anything vital has been missed, but it would be easier
to be accountable for accuracy if the doors didn't keep closing on
the really interesting debates, with civil society on the
outside.
Although the chairs for the subsidiary bodies were not named,
pending finalisation, they will be from the New Agenda Coalition
(SB1 on practical nuclear disarmament as well as related issues of
nuclear doctrine and security assurances); the Western Group (SB2,
covering regional issues and the Middle East); and the NAM (SB3 on
withdrawal from the treaty). This complements the committee chairs:
MC.1 (Indonesia, NAM); MC.2 (Hungary, Eastern European group); MC.3
(Sweden, Western group). In addition to the traditional allocation
of treaty articles to the committees, it was agreed that
disarmament and nonproliferation education would be addressed
within MC.1 and institutional issues, including proposals for
institutionally strengthening accountability, compliance and
implementation powers, within MC.2. It is understood that until
Wednesday May 25, two parallel sessions each morning and afternoon
will be divided equally among the committees and proportionally for
the subsidiary bodies. The president scheduled the drafting
committee to report to the conference Wednesday afternoon. That
would leave two days to wind up the conference.
This schedule will be very tight. According to Acronym's daily
updates from 2000 (available on the website), the committees were
underway before the first week was out and by the end of the second
week the chairs of the main committees had issued their first draft
working papers, which focussed on the issues of emerging areas of
consensus and of contention. Even so, negotiations on the key
issues took all of the remaining fortnight plus a further day as
the conference spilled beyond its last day and into Saturday
afternoon before agreement was locked down. The 2005 review
conference has seven working days left and the committees will
start work tomorrow. But perhaps they won't need all that time, as
a mysterious two-sided document appeared on tables in the
conference room and the nearby Vienna café. The paper,
structured as a 10-paragraph declaration, bore no indication of its
provenance, but its first paragraph prioritised the "changed"
security environment and emphasised "non-state actors, terrorists
and States in non-compliance", and the only references to the
outcomes of 1995 and 2000 are in paragraph 6 which "notes" progress
in their implementation, which might be a clue. Some carried the
title "Draft: Outcome of the 2005 Review Conference of the States
Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons",
while others, identical in wording, lacked any title. There was
much speculation about where this paper had come from, if it was
intentionally leaked, and whether it was an attempt to pre-empt,
contribute to - or, indeed, spoof - a possible 'common denominator'
product for this Review Conference.
18.5.05
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© 2005 The Acronym Institute.
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