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Rebecca Johnson
Back to the main page on the NPT
Gloom is settling in at the NPT Review Conference in New York as half way through the second week there is still no agreement on the agenda. Eleven more states gave speeches on Tuesday morning. These can be found at: http://www.un.org/events/npt2005/statements10may.html.
In one of the most pertinent statements, which included a graphic description of the effects of a nuclear bomb, Sri Lanka's Ambassador Prasad Kariyawasam quoted former UN Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs, Jayantha Dhanapala, President of the historic 1995 Review Conference: "Of all the challenges ahead for the treaty, complacency is arguably the greatest to overcome, because the NPT is not implemented on auto-pilot. It requires constant vigilance, care and attention, not just by responsible government officials, but also by the non-governmental community, the news media, and the general public... the mighty NPT is not immune to the risks of decline or collapse. The proven cases of noncompliance by NNWS and the snail's pace of nuclear disarmament have not contributed to the health of the regime."
With the General Debate due to finish on Wednesday morning, these prophetic words echoed in the half empty General Assembly hall. There were not enough speakers on the list for it to be worth holding a session in the afternoon. Without an agenda the main committees on nuclear disarmament, safeguards and energy have have not been convened.
Tuesday came and went with rumours and counter-rumours, news of a cobbled-together solution and then news of further problems and linkages. As negotiations are delicately poised (and subject to change) it will not be useful to publicise the details at this point. It is still hoped (at least by the optimists) that the Conference President, Ambassador Sergio Duarte, will be able to bring the gavel down on an agreed agenda on Wednesday. Since I will be going to Washington DC tomorrow to speak at George Washington University's Space Policy Institute's workshop on space security, I will not be able to report from the NPT Conference until Friday, so please check http://www.reachingcriticalwill.org whose updates will no doubt also cover Wednesday afternoon's session in Committee Room 4, at which delegations will hear statements from a few of the wide variety of NGOs that converged on New York last week.
Despite the lack of formal progress, delegates' time has been far from wasted. Dr Hans Blix, Chair of the Stockholm-based Weapons of Mass Destruction Commission, convened a fascinating discussion on "Why Do States Abandon Nuclear Weapons Ambitions", spearheaded by the research of Dr Jim Walsh of Harvard's Managing the Atom project. The large meeting was hosted by Finland, with presentations from Ambassador Abdul Minty on why and how South Africa gave up its nuclear weapon programme, and Commission-member Dr Patricia Lewis of UNIDIR, who analysed the larger implications for reinforcing the credibility of the nonproliferation regime that has played such an important part in creating the conditions for states to abandon nuclear weapon aspirations. This was followed in the evening by an illuminating panel co-hosted by the WMD Commission and the Global Security Initiative, at which two US Congressional Representatives, Edward J. Markey (D-MA) and Curt Weldon (R-PA) joined Dr Blix to discuss "US Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Goals: Honouring the Balance".
On Tuesday, Ireland and Canada co-hosted an informal meeting to discuss their ideas for providing NPT states parties with better institutional powers to oversee and strengthen the nonproliferation regime. A growing number of states are now expressing support and interest in proposals for annual meetings vested with greater authority and decision-making powers than possible under the current PrepCom-based review process. Over the lunch period, there was an unfortunate time-clash between two important meetings on verification. In one, Britain's Atomic Weapons Establishment presented its final report on the five-year study into nuclear disarmament verification initiated after the 2000 Review Conference. In the other, Dr Trevor Findlay, formerly of VERTIC and now with the new Canadian Centre for Treaty Compliance in Ottawa, presented his study on "A Standing United Nations WMD Verification Body: Necessary and Feasible", commissioned by the WMD Commission with sponsorship from New Zealand. Throughout the first 10 days, as documented by reachingcriticalwill.org, there have also been numerous NGO events and meetings on different aspects of nuclear disarmament, the fuel cycle, especially the need to halt all reprocessing and uranium enrichment, and wider aspects of peace and security. These will continue.
10.5.05
© 2005 The Acronym Institute.