Negative Security Assurances
What are Negative
Security Assurances? (NSAs)
What are Positive Security Assurances? (PSA)
Security Council resolution 255 and 984
Nuclear Weapon Free Zones (NWFZ)
NSAs in the NPT, the Conference on Disarmament
or the General Assembly?
What are Negative
Security Assurances? (NSAs)
What are Positive Security Assurances? (PSA)
Negative security assurances are guarantees by nuclear-weapon
states (NWS) not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against
states that have formally renounced nuclear weapons. The non-nuclear-weapon
states (NNWS) have traditionally pressed for such assurances in
the form of a free-standing treaty. Positive Security Assurances
are agreements between non nuclear weapons states and nuclear
weapons states that assistance will be provided to a non nuclear
weapons state if they are the victim of an act of nuclear weapons
aggression or they are threatened by nuclear weapons.
Negative Security Assurances have played a key role
in the nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT), since it's supposed
to convince states not to pursue a nuclear weapons option, but
rather to join the Treaty as Non-nuclear weapon States (NNWS).
The non-proliferation treaty aims to eliminate nuclear
weapons altogether, but as long as this has not been achieved,
security assurances should be made. Despite the strong push from
some NNWS, Russia, United Kingdom, United States and France have
not made these assurances. Only China has made an unconditional
assurance not to be "the first to use nuclear weapons against
non-nuclear weapon States or nuclear-weapons-free zones at any
time or under any circumstances"
Many NNWS continue to call for an internationally
legally binding treaty on negative security assurances.
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Security
Council resolution 255 and 984
During the NPT negotiations in 1968, resolution
255 was adopted in the Security Council on positive security assurances,
recognizing that the Council "would have to act immediately to
provide assistance, in accordance with their obligations under
the United Nations Charter, to a state victim of an act of nuclear
weapons aggression or object of a threat of such aggression"
In 1995, another resolution (984) was adopted by
the Security Council, this time with politically binding negative
security assurances. The resolution formally acknowledged the
commitments of the NWS to negative security assurances. However,
all NWS accept China made reservations and have expressed in their
military doctrines that using nuclear weapons could be an option
under certain circumstances. The United States has declared that
they maintain the use of nuclear weapons as a retaliatory measure
in the case of an attack on them with any weapons of mass destruction,
such as chemical or biological weapons.
A resolution is not consider to be legally binding
and the assurances in resolution 984 are conditional. Four of
the recognized nuclear weapons states (under the NPT) feel free
to resort to nuclear weapons, whenever they decide that the conditions
for use have been met.
With the exception of China, most nuclear weapon
states continue to believe that the political assurances provided
by their 1995 statements, recognized under Security Council Resolution
984, remain sufficient, thereby viewing as unnecessary any mechanism
that would mandate or encode NSAs in a legally binding manner.
For example, the United Kingdom stated in 2004 that
a general assurance to Non Nuclear Weapon States Party to the
NPT has already been given, and there is no need to repeat or
elaborate it. The way forward on NSAs, according to United Kingdom,
would be through Nuclear Weapon Free Zones.
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Nuclear Weapon
Free Zones (NWFZ)
Nuclear weapon free zones provide for another form
of negative security assurances, in a geographical limited area.
There are currently five treaty-based NWFZs worldwide. These govern
regions including Africa (Pelindaba
Treaty), Antarctica (Antarctic
Treaty), Latin America and the Caribbean (Treaty
of Tlatelolco), Southeast Asia (Treaty
of Bangkok) and the South Pacific (Treaty
of Rarotonga), although signatures and ratifications in the
African NWFZ are still necessary for its entry into force. All
existing NWFZs ensure the absence of nuclear weapons in a regional
zone of application defined within the treaty, place all regional
facilities under the inspection regime of the International Atomic
Energy Association (IAEA), prohibit the receipt, storage, installation,
deployment or any form of possession of all nuclear weapons, directly
or indirectly by any of the parties, by order of third parties
or by any other means, and enjoy negative security assurances
granted to them by the NWS through NWFZ treaty protocols.
The parties that sign these treaties also commit
abstain from carrying out, promoting, or authorizing, directly
or indirectly, the testing, use, fabrication, production, possession,
or control of all nuclear weapons or to participate in these activities
in any form.
Today, one NWFZ treaty or another covers virtually
the entire Southern Hemisphere of our planet. Brazil put forward
a First Committee resolution in 2003 entitled "Nuclear-weapon-free
southern hemisphere and adjacent area (A/RES/58/49), the UN General
Assembly called for the creation of a Southern Hemisphere and
adjacent areas NWFZ treaty, uniting the current zones around the
planet and also including the seas. This will mean that ships
transporting nuclear weapons will not be allowed and all nuclear
weapons will be concentrated in the northern half of the world.
None of the NWS have signed the Treaty of Bangkok,
since the South East Asia Zone includes large areas of international
water. The NWS are mainly concerned over the possible passage
of nuclear armed naval vessels through these waters. Although
all five NWS have signed the Pelindaba Treaty, the United States
and Russia have not ratified it. Russia has not done it because
of its concerns about the status of the Indian Ocean island archipelago
and United States argue that it maintains rights to use nuclear
weapons in the case of an attack by an African state. NNWS that
are outside these free zones will not be able to benefit from
these kinds of security assurances.
There is a draft Central
Asian Nuclear Free Zone Treaty that will hopefully be adopted.
The five Central Asian states will sign the Treaty on 8 September
2006.
Also a NWFZ in the Middle East has been discussed,
but Israel's assumed nuclear capability is an obstacle to any
progress in this area. The call for a Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone
(NWFZ) in the Middle East was first issued in 1974, when the United
Nations General Assembly passed a resolution calling for all states
in the region to declare that they will refrain from producing,
acquiring or in any way possessing nuclear weapons and nuclear
explosive devices and from permitting the stationing of nuclear
weapons on their territory by any third party. It also called
for the states to place all their nuclear facilities under International
Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards. In subsequent years, the
General Assembly on several occasions renewed its call.
Israel remains a possible nuclear weapon state,
and has rejected calls to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty
or place its nuclear facilities under IAEA inspection as mandated
by UN Security Council Resolution 487. Other countries in the
region have long asserted that Israel's nuclear arsenal poses
a threat to their security and is a provocation to nuclear proliferation.
Now that Iran has withdrawn certain of its facilities from IAEA
supervision and may begin enriching uranium with the purpose of
building nuclear weapons, there is special urgency to begin once
more a diplomatic process that will lead to the Middle East NFZ.
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NSAs in the
NPT, the Conference on Disarmament or the General Assembly?
Should negotiations about an internationally legally
binding treaty be started in the Conference
on Disarmament or in the NPT?
Security assurances have been at the heart of the NPT since the
treaty's inception. Some states think negotiations on NSAs should
be held in the framework of the NPT rather than the Conference
on Disarmament. NPT would then be the more appropriate forum,
because only non nuclear weapon states in compliance with the
NPT should benefit from such assurances. However, points have
been made that some states with nuclear weapons are not members
of the NPT, and the Conference on Disarmament is the only negotiating
forum for disarmament with all nuclear weapons possessors as members.
The General Assembly is another option, where negotiations can
be advocated. The problem with the General Assembly is that it
will only make recommendations, and not legally binding treaties.
A resolution is not consider to be legally binding just like Security
Council Resolution 255 and 984.
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