ACRONYM Reports

Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty: The Endgame

ACRONYM Report No.9, April 1996

Executive Summary

Negotiations for a comprehensive test ban treaty (CTBT) opened at the Conference on Disarmament (CD) in January 1994 and continued through the year, resulting in a heavily-bracketed rolling text in September 1994. This formed the basis for negotiations in 1995 and 1996. ACRONYM 9 reviews the first part of the 1996 session, from January 23 to March 29 and assesses the prospects of achieving a CTBT this year.

The unanimous UN General Assembly resolution in December 1995 called for the CTBT to be ready 'by the outset of the fifty-first session of the General Assembly', which opens in September. This would require the treaty text to be substantially finished by June 30, a deadline that most countries support.
With at least four states - China, India, Pakistan and Russia û opposed to any 'premature' Chair's initiative to accelerate negotiations at this time, Ambassador Jaap Ramaker, Chair of the Nuclear Test Ban Committee, has tabled a working paper to lay the groundwork for a Chair's draft treaty, expected in June. He identified six outstanding issues which must be resolved by political decision: the preamble; the scope and basic obligations; the composition of the Executive Council; the responsibilities and products of the international data centre; on-site inspections; and entry into force.
Now that France has ceased testing and the US, UK and France are committed to a true zero yield test ban, the countries giving most cause for concern are China, India and Pakistan. Whilst Russia has been creating difficulties over zero yield and verification at the test sites, it is not expected to delay conclusion. Though the signs are positive that China would join a CTBT, its fundamentally different approach from the majority of states on several key issues is making agreement very difficult. India's nuclear weapons possession and policy have become a political football in the run-up to parliamentary elections. If predictions of a hung parliament are fulfilled, India's position may be complicated even further. While some of India's recent proposals were undoubtedly intended to strengthen the treaty, there is concern that India may also be laying the groundwork for refusing to sign.
Decisions remaining on scope and the preamble will affect the fundamental nature of the treaty: how comprehensive, how universal, and how it relates to nuclear disarmament. China still insists on 'peaceful' nuclear explosions, which everyone else wants banned. The majority of states support India's desire for the preamble to include the aspiration of preventing new and qualitative nuclear weapon development. They also support reference to nuclear disarmament, but oppose India's insistence for structural linkage between this treaty and commitment to nuclear disarmament in a time-bound framework. Much more could be done by the nuclear weapon states to meet the legitimate desire of the majority of countries to see greater progress on nuclear disarmament, including multilateral negotiations in the context of the CD.
The current structure of negotiations, working through a rolling text containing over 1200 brackets with two working groups and ten Friends of the Chair on particular issues, is too cumbersome for the endgame. As shown by model treaties put forward by Iran and Australia in February, the remaining decisions are pre-eminently political, not technical. For Ramaker's two-stage strategy to work, delegations must make hard compromises in the next few weeks. If political manoeuvring persists beyond June, the opportunity for a CTBT may be lost. A change of administration in the US tipped the balance towards a CTBT in 1992. Forthcoming elections in India, Russia and the US in 1996 could tip the balance away again.
Given the strongly held positions of several key nuclear weapon and nuclear threshold states, it is likely that the next phase of negotiations will be confrontational. The timing and content of Ramaker's endgame strategy will be important, but in the final analysis the political decisions made in capital cities will determine the outcome. Public opinion throughout the world has shown that it thinks a CTBT is long overdue. All nuclear explosions should now be banned for all time. All eyes will be watching to see if the CD can deliver.