Needed: an NPT emergency response mechanism

Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)

Conference on Disarmament

General Assembly First Committee

UN Disarmament Commission

Special Session on Disarmament

Needed: an NPT emergency response mechanism

Presented by: Aaron Tovish, NGO Committee on Disarmament

Within the last year there have been two major crises involving NPT compliance issues: Iraq and North Korea. But these are just the latest in a string of crises going back to 1991. Iraq and North Korea featured already in those earlier days, but there was also the break up of the soviet union with the potential emergence of several new nuclear weapon states in 1993; and in 1998 the nuclear test explosions of India and Pakistan announcing in no uncertain terms their desire to be considered nuclear-weapon states - since then two confrontations between them have had alarming nuclear overtones. We do not have the luxury here and now to do a thorough historical review of how these various challenges were handled - or mishandled. Looking forward, instead, the question of how future nuclear nonproliferation regime crises will be handled cries out for urgent attention and action.

This concern has been the subject of discussion among NGO activists and diplomats here in Geneva. The wider NGO community, recognizing the urgency of this topic, has agreed that it would be useful to put forward the tentative and preliminary results of these efforts today in this setting, even though NGOs have had only a limited opportunity as of yet to evaluate and development them. It is in that spirit that we hope this gathering will also receive them.

(1) The announced withdrawal of North Korea was the starting point of this line of work here in Geneva, so I will begin with a specific proposal for a collective response to withdrawal notification.

The Article X notification period does more than provide early warning to the other parties of a change in treaty status; it provides a cooling-off period in which the concerns raised by the withdrawing party can be considered and, where justified, addressed. To this end, the full 90 days must be available to resolve a crisis.

The 90-day notification period must be 90 days, nothing less.

North Korea's overnight withdrawal must not be allowed to stand as a precedent. In retrospect, it was a mistake not to have explicitly rejected the suspension formula the DPRK advanced in 1993.

The parties to the treaty must have a mechanism for collectively addressing the crisis until the withdrawal either is retracted or takes effect.

There are any number of ways the 90 days could be put to good use. By way of illustration, one possible approach would be for the bureau of the most recent NPT review process to meet within 24 hours of the notification. It would be pre-mandated to investigate any withdrawal and attempt to resolve it. The withdrawing party would be done the courtesy of having its withdrawal statement thoroughly evaluated. The bureau would meet with the party if it were willing to do so. If no positive resolution of the matter was possible within, say, the first 30 days, the bureau would report to an emergency meeting of all the states parties - including the withdrawing party. For the next 30 days this meeting would operate on the basis of consensus. If after 60 days the countdown to withdrawal had still not been stopped, the meeting would be able to vote on decisions as needed. It could be, for example, that the vast majority of parties do not find the reasons given for withdrawal compelling. It might be sobering for the withdrawing nation to be clearly told that through a vote of the states parties.

The withdrawal of a party from the treaty represents a potential threat to international peace and security. As such, according to the 1992 Security Council summit, the Security Council should become seized of the matter immediately. This is proper, but it should not be presumed that the withdrawing party is the sole source of the crisis - it may have just grievances. It must be able to get a fair hearing - all the more so, if it is in good standing with the treaty at the time of withdrawal. Because of its preponderance of the nuclear-weapon states, the impartiality of the Security Council will inevitably be open to question. It is essential that all the NPT parties meet so that, when the Security Council acts, it does so within a wider - indeed global - context.

The UN General Assembly is a good candidate for the venue in which the NPT members would meet in withdrawal cases, but I will have more to say on the GA later.

(2) Building on the withdrawal case, a general mechanism for collective emergency action also seemed worth exploring. Some preliminary ideas emerged:

The original motivation for the NGO committee for disarmament's NPT project was to defend the NPT. As the NPT is fundamentally a bargain, that means defending all aspects of that bargain. After two decades of non-fulfillment of Article VI obligations, a somewhat counterproductive attitude took root in our own NGO ranks and in the ranks of the non-nuclear-weapon states when proliferation compliance issues arose in the 1990s. The attitude could be broadly characterized like so: "let the nuclear-weapon states sort out the problems of proliferation compliance since it is their fault that states are losing faith in the NPT bargain." The result has been that the problems often get unnecessarily polarized and they are only partially resolved. The full weight of the NPT community is never brought to bear, and the problems fester.

We were all taught at an early age that "two wrongs do not make a right." Nonproliferation problems have now combined with disarmament stagnation to drag down the entire nonproliferation regime. It is time to vigorously reverse this trend. No state party, or NGO, is excused from this task.

Because of its vast resources, the United States is a natural leader on non-compliance issues. Its intelligence systems pick up possible evidence of non-compliance before anyone else (usually). Its large diplomatic corps can rapidly have a major presence on any issue. If economic sweeteners are needed to strike a deal, the US has an ample reserve. If coercive methods are deemed necessary there is no shortage there. Other countries that might like to contribute often find themselves in a tag-along mode, or even "dis-invited."

But most countries simply stand back and let the US run the show - for better or worse. They do not want to be associated with a hypocritical exercise of power. They view the US as quick to see the faults in others and slow to see its own faults. The United States, for its part, sees it the other way around, reasoning, perhaps, "If hardly anyone is willing to stand with us against proliferation, how serious can their professed commitment to nuclear disarmament be?"

To break out of this rut, a new pattern of interaction is needed. It must put the NPT itself in the foreground. The individual member must have a means of expression in which its voice is a legitimate and equal part of a collective voice.

The review process serves that objective only on long-term issues. For crises it is next to useless. In practical terms, a crisis could be defined as a crisis if it cannot be put off until the next Review Conference or Prepcom.

The NPT community needs a mechanism for convening on an emergency basis.

Whenever any party or group of parties feels that the treaty faces a serious, urgent challenge, they should be able to instigate a process that could lead to the convocation of a meeting of the parties on short notice. As suggested in the withdrawal case, the NPT bureau could be the initial responder. Its first order of business would be to determine if its members agree that a meeting of all the parties is necessary. If they are not in full agreement, a vote could decide the matter. There can be no question of vetoes in this context.

Once the parties meet, the primary objective must be to resolve the crisis. Almost by definition, this should be a consensus building process, so vote taking would be out of order. But if the prospect of resolving matters voluntarily has faded,

The meeting of the parties must be able to take decisions by voting.

If the collective voice is to be heard, the option to vote must be available. The parties should remain seized of the issue until it is resolved, or deemed manageable within the regular review process.

The most promising candidate for the emergency meeting venue is the UN General Assembly.

Aside from the fact that voting is a natural feature of the General Assembly, it also has recently developed the capacity to convene at any time on short notice. It is also worth something that the GA is already fully funded.

The Statutes of the IAEA require it to report compliance problems it cannot resolve to both the Security Council and the General Assembly. The two bodies should work in close coordination. The United Nations Charter requires that any concurrent involvement of the General Assembly has to first be approved by the Security Council. Since there will always be an ample NPT majority on the Council, this approval is assured - as long as the nuclear-weapon states - the P5 - honor a prior undertaking to this effect.

The small clutch of non-parties might object to the General Assembly being "hijacked" for NPT business. But the near-universality of treaty membership, means that the NPT parties could turn a deaf ear to these objections without fear of setting a bad precedent.

It must be emphasized that

This response mechanism must be available equally for NPT nonproliferation compliance crises and for NPT disarmament compliance crises.

A good example of the latter would be an announcement by a nuclear-weapon state that it plans to resume nuclear weapon testing. Advance warning of an impending test could be relatively short, so the need for rapid consideration of the issue would be great.

By general treaty standards, the NPT is rather bare-boned in the mechanisms department. If it is going to handle the difficult times ahead, it must beef up a bit. Aside from an emergency response mechanism, other institutional mechanisms that deserve consideration are NPT task forces - such as one on NSAs -- and a permanent treaty secretariat.