Looking at the NPT and Beyond
Ronald McCoy
The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), which was ratified in 1970, is the only legally binding international agreement on nuclear disarmament. It is based on a quid pro quo by 188 states. The nuclear weapon states promised to give up their nuclear weapons and in return the non-nuclear weapon states renounced nuclear weapons and were guaranteed access to peaceful uses of nuclear energy.
In the past 35 years, there have been six NPT Review Conferences, the final reports of which often consisted of a litany of promises that were made and broken. The record of NPT negotiations is tarnished by examples of narrow national interests trumping common global interests. In 1995, at the fifth NPT Review Conference, the indefinite extension of the NPT was secured, on the strength of promises made in the final document, Principles and Objectives for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament. Five years later, the sixth NPT Review Conference, in its final statement, outlined an agreement by all States parties to implement thirteen practical steps for systematic and progressive disarmament, including “an unequivocal undertaking by the nuclear weapon states to accomplish the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals.”
As we approach the seventh NPT Review Conference in May 2005, there is widespread consensus that the integrity of the NPT is seriously under threat as there are clear signs that many of the thirteen practical steps have not been acted on, such as:
securing the early entry into force of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT);
negotiating a fissile materials treaty;
establishing a subsidiary body in the Conference on Disarmament (CD) to deal specifically with nuclear disarmament;
applying the principles of transparency and irreversibility to American and Russian arms reduction agreements;
controlling and eliminating nonstrategic nuclear weapons held by the United States and Russia;
reducing the operational status of nuclear weapons.
The 1996 report of the Canberra Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons warned that the possession of nuclear weapons by any state is a constant stimulus to other states to acquire them. In other words, nuclear apartheid breeds proliferation.
The 2004 Report of the UN Secretary-General’s High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change has warned about the possible collapse of the NPT regime: “The nuclear non-proliferation regime is now at risk because of lack of compliance with existing commitments, withdrawal or threat of withdrawal from the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons to escape those commitments, a changing international security environment and the diffusion of technology. We are approaching a point at which the erosion of the nonproliferation regime could become irreversible and result in a cascade of proliferation.”
The integrity and credibility of the NPT will largely depend on an even-handed, balanced approach by States parties to both disarmament and non-proliferation obligations at the 2005 NPT Review Conference. The recent revelation of a clandestine black-market in nuclear technology and nuclear developments in North Korea and Iran suggest that the nuclear proliferation concerns of the nuclear weapon states will dominate the conference and marginalize the disarmament concerns of the non-nuclear weapon states.
To succeed, the 2005 NPT Review Conference must generate the political will to adhere to the obligations and commitments made in 2000 and to build on the 13 Practical Steps, particularly the “unequivocal undertaking” by the nuclear weapon states to eliminate their nuclear arsenals. The nuclear weapon states have to understand that all the other practical steps stem from this fundamental undertaking. This is the intrinsic core of the NPT, because nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation are two sides of the same coin.
We know that since the 2000 NPT Review Conference, none of the nuclear weapon States parties to the NPT has taken this undertaking seriously:
Not one nuclear weapon state has abandoned plans to develop new nuclear weapons.
The new US nuclear doctrine envisages a new triad of capabilities and new weapons, and expanding the role of nuclear weapons beyond their core function of deterrence to their use as ‘legitimate’ tactical weapons on the battlefield.
Russia has announced plans to build a new generation of “hypersonic” multiple warhead missiles to counter US plans to mount ballistic missile defences.
Britain plans to replace Trident warheads and has renewed its collaboration with the US on nuclear weapons research at Los Alamos and Lawrence Livermore laboratories, including advanced computer simulation technology for designing, developing and testing new weapons.
France is modernizing its nuclear arsenal, which now boasts two new French missiles for nuclear warheads.
China also continues to modernize its nuclear arsenal to keep up with the rest.
To demonstrate genuine good faith, the nuclear weapon states would have to renounce nuclear weapons as the cornerstone of security, renounce plans to develop new nuclear weapons and weaponise outer space, de-alert all nuclear weapons, extend negative security assurances to non-nuclear weapon states, ratify the CTBT, start negotiating a fissile materials treaty, and set up a subsidiary body in the CD to deal with nuclear disarmament in all its aspects.
For the past 35 years, the NPT process has been a predictable diplomatic charade. It is diplomatic gamesmanship at its best, worthy of a world cup. Disarmament activists have seen how one-sided interpretations of simple words and phrases have been used to distort negotiations and thwart disarmament initiatives. Such diplomatic activity has provided an insight into the inbuilt ambivalence and deceptiveness of nuanced diplomatic language, which engenders distrust, suspicion and instability in international relations.
Each Review Conference is an opportunity for the international disarmament community to hold governments accountable to their NPT obligations. Although it is obligatory for States parties to submit regular reports on the implementation of Article VI in order to ensure transparency and accountability, the record shows that reporting is minimal. Only 39 States parties have submitted at least one formal report and none of the nuclear weapon states have submitted an official conference document.
It would be fair to say that the NPT is not in good health and that the prognosis is ‘guarded,’ to use a medical term when a patient is in a serious condition. There is an urgent need to address the dichotomy between the nuclear weapon states and the non-nuclear weapon states, restore the health of the NPT, and reduce nuclear dangers stemming from nuclear proliferation and nuclear terrorism. It will take an even-handed, balanced approach to build a bridge between the two, although evenhandedness is a rare quality in international affairs, where national interests override global interests.
The New Agenda Coalition (NAC) countries – Brazil, Egypt, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa and Sweden have been playing a bridging role in the United Nations. By agreeing on a pragmatic agenda for the implementation of key priorities in both segments of the dichotomy disarmament and non-proliferation the NAC could close the gaps in the NPT debate. Through a series of resolutions that have been adopted by the UN General Assembly since November 2000, the NAC has the potential to form a partnership of like-minded states, within and without nuclear alliances, to exert leverage on the nuclear weapon states to comply with their NPT obligations, as spelt out in the 13 Practical Steps. In 2004, the NAC resolution was adopted by the UN General Assembly by a vote of 151 to 6, with 24 abstentions. Eight NATO member states Belgium, Canada, Germany, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Norway, Lithuania and Turkey voted for the resolution, as did Japan and South Korea, two allies of the United States. The United States, Britain, France, Israel, Latvia and Palau voted against.
If the NPT lingers on and requires intensive care, it would be appropriate to look beyond the NPT and seek a fresh approach, in parallel with the NPT, such as by adopting a framework for the abolition of nuclear weapons through a Nuclear Weapons Convention, now made feasible by advances in verification technology and compliance procedures. Considerable conceptual work has already been done on the legal, technical and political requirements for achieving and maintaining a nuclear weapons free world, including the drafting, circulation and submission of a Model Nuclear Weapons Convention to the United Nations.
The Model Nuclear Weapons Convention does not answer all the questions involved in the abolition of nuclear weapons, but it does indicate that such questions can be answered when negotiations are under way and that nuclear abolition is a practical achievable goal.
While nuclear disarmament is primarily a technical process of dismantling and eliminating nuclear weapons, nuclear abolition is primarily a normative process of prohibiting the development, acquisition, transfer, use and threat of use of nuclear weapons, but also embraces elimination.
Nuclear disarmament relates to positive obligations, that is, to eliminate stockpiles. Nuclear abolition includes both positive obligations and negative obligations, which include not acquiring, transferring, using or threatening to use nuclear weapons. In other words, nuclear abolition combines the positive obligations of eliminating nuclear weapons or disarmament with the negative obligations of not acquiring them or non-proliferation. Nuclear abolition is therefore the synthesis of the two competing approaches in the NPT disarmament and non-proliferation.
The concept of an abolition framework is therefore close to what the nuclear weapon states have already agreed on disarmament and it encompasses their concerns about non-proliferation. As such, it may be an easier framework with which to engage the nuclear weapon states than one which focuses purely on disarmament.
The Canberra Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons affirmed that there were no inherent obstacles to nuclear abolition except a lack of political will. One effective way of generating political will and building worldwide support for abolition would be the Emergency Campaign to Ban Nuclear Weapons or “2020 Vision”, launched in 2003, led by the Mayors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, and supported by a global Mayors for Peace network, whose target is the elimination of nuclear weapons by 2020. The campaign has already attracted the support of almost one thousand mayors, including those of capital cities in the nuclear weapon states.
Yet another approach would be to follow the ‘Ottawa Process’ which demonstrated the power of partnership between civil society, like-minded governments, international agencies and the United Nations in redressing the global problem of antipersonnel landmines and securing a Mine Ban Treaty in 1997. When it became clear to Canada’s Foreign Minister, Lloyd Axworthy, that a few key States were intent on disrupting negotiations in the United Nations for a ban on anti-personnel landmines, he initiated an alternative approach by inviting all interested States (Norway, Austria, Germany, Belgium, South Africa) and the International Campaign to Ban Landmines (ICBL) to Ottawa, to negotiate and adopt a treaty, outside traditional diplomatic fora, practices and methods.
The Mine Ban Treaty demonstrated that it is possible for small and medium-sized countries, acting in concert with civil society, to provide global moral leadership and achieve major diplomatic victories, even in the face of opposition from major countries. It showed that civil society has the ability to rouse public opinion and conscience on humanitarian issues.
Although there are political, military and strategic differences between landmines and nuclear weapons, there is considerable merit in the concept of an independent Ottawa-style conference on nuclear abolition, in which all States are invited to join and work on abolition measures, even if not all nuclear weapon states will agree. Like the Ottawa Process, such a conference would generate considerable media coverage and political pressure on all nuclear weapon states, declared and undeclared, to abandon nuclear deterrence and embrace abolition.
Such a conference would be a useful forum for setting out plans and procedures required for the abolition of nuclear weapons, including key issues such as security assurances, compliance measures, a verification regime, and disposition of fissile materials. There are a number of States with the right credentials to initiate or lead an Ottawa-style process.
Whatever the reasons or concerns that have led some States to develop nuclear weapons and doctrines, nuclear weapons pose an intolerable threat to humanity and must be abolished. The NPT has failed abysmally to enforce compliance with both disarmament and non-proliferation obligations among States parties. Unless the 2005 NPT Review Conference can show that there has been unequivocal progress on the 13 Practical Steps, the time has come to explore other approaches to nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation. The NPT road map has been there for 35 years. A dog-eared, faded treaty, stained with the tears of frustration and disappointment, a mockery of diplomacy, a testament of hypocrisy and double standards, and of cruel betrayal of hibakusha and our humanity. When the majority of the people of the world are in favour of abolishing nuclear weapons, what will it take to translate the will of the majority into democratic action to overturn the political and military power of the few?
