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Rebecca Johnson
Back to the main page on the NPT
The penultimate day confirmed yesterday's prognosis that there will be no substantive agreement coming out of the NPT Review Conference. The morning opened with a short plenary in which the president, Ambassador Sergio Duarte of Brazil, told the Conference that he would schedule two plenaries for Friday, morning and afternoon, "with presentation of the chairs' reports, after which we will consider and adopt the final document... after which delegations will make statements" before the conference is concluded. The meeting was then closed and civil society requested to leave, which we did. I wondered for a hopeful moment if he intended to convene negotiations to find a way to adopt at least some of the aspirations and recommendations contained in the stymied reports from the various committees and subsidiary bodies; but no, it turned out the business too sensitive for civil society ears was an attempt to resolve yesterday's replay of the agenda conflict, and the reports we can expect tomorrow are only from such scintillating bodies as the credentials committee. Though of course such things are very important!
The rest of the day there were group meetings and closed sessions on the 'technical report', in particular the characterisation of the agenda decision that had been challenged yesterday by the UK. After much wrangling, it was decided to remove the text of the NAM's statement of understanding from the technical report of the conference, while keeping in the sentence of the president's understanding. Apart from that, the report will list various officers, documents and meetings. It will not contain any ideas or recommendations for work for the future. Having deleted the actual text of the NAM understanding, it will not even refer to the review conference outcomes of 1995 and 2000.
In view of the serious proliferation problems in the world, it is a great pity that the 2005 Review Conference has not been able to adopt measures that would strengthen the NPT, but it is not calamitous, as some have suggested. Having been adopted by consensus and not yet implemented, the agreements obtained in the review conferences of 1995 and 2000 still stand. Lack of agreement at the 2005 RevCon is to be deplored because it may erode confidence in the regime, but it neither invalidates nor undermines relevant obligations and undertakings previously agreed to. They continue to stand as benchmarks for measuring progress and promoting compliance until the treaty is fully implemented in all its nuclear disarmament and nonproliferation contexts.
During the plenary, the Japanese ambassador read a message from Foreign Minister Nobutaka Machimura: "Given the serious challenges the NPT regime is currently facing, it is an urgent task for the State Parties to maintain and strengthen the authority and credibility of the NPT". He expressed the "strong hope" that the RevCon "would issue a robust message enabling the NPT regime to be further consolidated. Remaining time is limited and the task ahead is tremendous. Each one of the State Parties shares the responsibility to make this Conference a success. With our creative and cooperative efforts, an agreed document is still achievable. Japan will not spare any efforts to this end." Luxembourg on behalf of the EU and Egypt on behalf of the Arab Group said they agreed with the Japanese foreign minister and pledged their full support to work intensively and cooperatively to achieve consensus on a final document, but some delegations greeted Egypt's statement with laughter, which does not bode well.
26.5.05
© 2005 The Acronym Institute.