Reaching Critical Will

Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)

Conference on Disarmament

General Assembly First Committee

UN Disarmament Commission

Special Session on Disarmament

Unofficial Transcript of Statement to the Conference on Disarmament by Ambassador Yoshiki Mine, Japan, 7 March 2006

Thank you Mr. President,

And I would like to thank Dr. Kang for the statement, very clear statement, which was full of interest and motivations. And also I was quite pleased to hear the intervention of the German Ambassador Bernhard Brasack. I would like to take this opportunity, because we have the important presence of Dr. Kang, which is a very rare case, and we should like to take the profit from your presence, Dr. Kang. And I am interested in asking you a question which has been bothering me personally for a long time, particularly concerning what we have debated today, including FMCT and other items: irreversibility, verifiability and other aspects of nuclear disarmament. I hope this question would not embarrass you, but what I would like to ask is what you think about the Five Ambassadors’ formula which deals with the major items: nuclear disarmament, Negative Security Assurances, PAROS and FMCT altogether. In a sense, I am stepping in a certain technical area, so I don’t know whether you know, you must be busy with also other areas, but if you have some basic view of this package – unfortunate package – I would be very pleased to learn from you about the future directions of our efforts to deal with this item of the A5 proposal, which had significance at a certain point, and which we still support in our formal positions, but I think it is still useful to look at whether this is still valid or not.

Thank you.

Unofficial Transcript of Statement to the Conference on Disarmament by Ambassador Johannes Landmann, the Netherlands, 7 March 2006

Mr. President,

Last week we felt we had a fruitful and frank exchange of views on the issues of nuclear disarmament. There were many speakers, and we were pleased with the transparency shown by several – in particular by the nuclear weapons states in accounting for their reduction measurements of nuclear weapons in recent years. And we continue to encourage such nuclear weapons states who haven't done so yet to follow that example.

My authorities were also pleased to note that a cross regional understanding emerged about negotiations on a Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty being the next logical step towards nuclear disarmament, since it is our strong conviction that an FMCT would benefit all of the CD members. Of course, there were different views expressed on what should a treaty entail, for instance on scope and verification. This, however, should not prevent us from entering into negotiations at the earliest possibility. Differences should be accommodated during negotiations.

Starting negotiations on an FMCT as first step towards nuclear disarmament at this stage should definitely no longer be postponed. We have said it before, and I will say it again today: it is time the CD starts working again.

After starting negotiations on FMCT, which will, for sure, take several years to conclude, the CD would, we believe, have gained momentum and be ready to tackle the remaining issues on the agenda in a much more propitious environment.

My government, like Germany and the Republic of Korea said it before me, is for a phased approach, and for sure we are ready to engage in such further negotiations.

Unofficial Transcript of Statement to the Conference on Disarmament by Ambassador Paul Meyer, Canada, 7 March 2006

Thank you Mr. President,

Let me congratulate those colleagues that have participated, I think, in a particularly rich discussion on this broad theme of nuclear disarmament last week and also today. I was particularly struck by the common interest in the theme of transparency, and I do think that when we look at the challenge of nuclear disarmament, it is a vital preliminary role that is played by transparency, both in terms of getting the facts clear and agreed, and secondly in the confidence building that it provides. I think we can develop this further. You referred to a compilation of ideas, I would think there's a lot of scope, building on the very helpful interventions of the US and Russian delegations in this debate, I think we could seek to formulate that transparency in a further step. I would ask those delegations to consider whether they might be able to provide an annual indication since the Moscow Treaty came into effect, in 2003 I believe, of the reductions and types that have been achieved since that date, and secondly a projection over the next five years, again on an annual basis on what they intend to achieve in terms of further progress on reductions. Clearly that would only be an indicative timetable on the projection and subject to various developments, but I think it would serve a great purpose in indicating the glide scope consistently downwards as those two countries move to implement this significant agreement. The third element, it goes a little bit beyond mere transparency, but I think it would also serve as an important confidence building measure if the two Parties could agree on what the final destination was. You recall, the treaty was formulated with result between 17oo and 2200 strategic systems. I think, if they could agree soon on a final number there, preferably I will confess, a lower number- perhaps the low end of that spectrum, I think that, too, could serve an important purpose.

We heard from our German colleague just now there is also in the area of non-strategic nuclear weapons where some information exchange, I think, would serve an important confidence building purpose. We recognize that there are security considerations here at play, but surely they do not pertain when we are just talking about aggregated totals, rather than elements that would be site specific. So here again I think building on the accomplishments already done this would be a further way of advancing these purposes.

That is regarding the element of transparency. Regarding the challenge of this body and how we continue to move beyond our general statements to some greater engagement with the substance of the issues we have before us, I think we need to make further progress here as well I'm cautious that we have six Friends of the President that have been named, very distinguished colleagues among us, and I'm sure they are honored to have been selected in this way, I suspect they would be even more honored, and more pleased if they could be given something substantive to do, relating to the purposes of this conference.

Mr. President, you outlined at the end of last week and you reiterated it today again, certain major themes that had emerged from the discussion: the role of nuclear weapons in security policy; transparency, which I just referred to now; irreversibility; and FMCT. Could I suggest that each of those themes might warrant being assigned to a Friends of the President and they would be asked to take this work forward in an informal mode, presumably, to see if we can extract more value from our discussion and, ideally, identify some measures of practical utility relating to those themes. I think that is a way in which we could make better of these individuals and, frankly, better use of the time available to this conference.

I thank you.

Unofficial Transcript of Statement to the Conference on Disarmament by Ambassador Mary Whelan, Ireland, 7 March 2006

Could I commend you in the way you have conducted focused discussion and continued the discussion this week? And I think you have indeed extrapolated four themes that have come out of our discussion. Today, like Canada, we would like explore ways of deepening that discussion so that we don’t have the sense that we have done nuclear disarmament items 1 & 2, now let’s move on to the next focused discussion. In other words, I would like to pursue the question of how we can give more depth to our deliberations over the next few weeks. In that context, I look forward very much to the appearance of the compilation document, and would like to ask when can we expect to see that document.

Could I also thank very much Dr. Kang Kyung-wha for her reference to Irish statement last week, and we would certainly look forward to working with other delegations on the issue of transparency, if that was something that people felt we could take further at the session.

Thank you.