Disarmament Insight

Conference on Disarmament: Time for Change

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Tue, 22 Aug 2017 13:38:00 +0000

These are some notes that formed the basis of a talk on the Conference on Disarmament to the UN Disarmament Fellows on 21 August 2017.

1. In 1978, the UN General Assembly (UNGA) established the CD as a ‘single multilateral disarmament negotiating forum of the international community’ (see para 120 of the report of the First Special Session on Disarmament (UNSSOD-1)). It is a ‘single’ forum in the sense that it is a standing body with its own secretariat that can conduct negotiations sequentially on agreed topics. In that sense it is a convenient venue for disarmament negotiations, but it is not an exclusive one—it is NOT the ‘sole’ forum.

2. The CD was set up as a ‘negotiating body’. This is in contrast to the UN Disarmament Commission and the First Committee of the UNGA that are ‘deliberative’ forums—venues for developing understandings at most rather than legally-binding treaties. The last negotiations carried out in the CD were from 1994 to 1996 to develop a treaty banning the testing of nuclear weapons (CTBT). Since then, the Conference has briefly begun negotiations on banning fissile material and on negative security assurances (both in 1998) but neither negotiation was sustained beyond that year. Increasingly, States have turned to alternative forums – UNGA (e.g., for the ATT, FMCT and TPNW), Diplomatic Conferences (APMBC and CCM).

3. The CD is a negotiating forum of limited membership (65 States). UNSSOD-1 attached ‘great importance’ to the participation of all the nuclear-weapon States. To ensure this, decision-making has to be by consensus (i.e., the absence of a formal objection). This avoids situations, for example, where those States would find themselves in a minority, out-voted on matters affecting nuclear weapons. The consensus rule in the CD is not in itself the reason for the CD’s longstanding deadlock. But because consensus is the sole decision-making rule, there is a responsibility on all members to apply it in a principled way. It should not be treated as a blunt veto but should be used sparingly, ideally only in situations where genuine and exhaustive efforts to seek consensus have been made and where a State’s national interests would be palpably jeopardized. In any event, the difficulty of separating substance from procedure in relation to the weighty security topics on the CD’s agenda means that it is unlikely that members would agree to finessing the consensus rule in any way far less incorporating additional decision-making rules.

4. The terms of reference of the CD include practically all multilateral arms control and disarmament problems. Currently the CD primarily concentrates on four ‘core’ issues:

- nuclear disarmament,

- banning the production of fissile material for use in nuclear weapons (FM(C)T);

- preventing an arms race in outer space (PAROS); and

- assuring non-nuclear-weapon States against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons (NSAs).

The terms of reference of the CD should not to be confused with its annual agenda, or with the Programme of Work (PoW) which is required to be negotiated and adopted at the beginning of each year (Rule 28).

5. The Rules of Procedure of the CD are sometimes blamed for inhibiting the Conference. But the problem is less the rules themselves—after all, they served satisfactorily in the past—and more the manner in which the members choose to apply them. For instance, throughout these past 20 unproductive years the practice of linking mandates for dealing with all four core issues within a single Programme of Work is at odds with the rules. The PoW needs be no more than a schedule of activities - there is no need for it to embody any mandates let alone linking all four where, given the consensus rule, if there's a formal objection to one of the mandates in the PoW they all fail. Mandates, of course, are required for each negotiation the CD launches, but they don't have to be actually incorporated in the PoW.

6. During debates in the CD, States often lament the ‘absence of political will’ amongst members. But the problem is the clashing of political wills, not their absence. Some States want action and progress, but others prefer the status quo. Traditionally, security issues take time to negotiate. Sadly, however, efforts to recognise and overcome the clash of wills have been fitful and feeble. Hesitant attempts have been made to move away from PoWs that link all four core issues, to change the focus of the Conference to new issues, to intensify discussions via an informal Working Group on the way ahead, etc. These attempts have yet to bear fruit.

If the CD is to prosper once again, members are faced with a more existential choice. Is the CD going to surrender in effect to irrelevance in the face of the challenge of negotiating in a highly disturbed global security environment? Or is it going to respond to that challenge by getting back to basics:

- acknowledging that the longstanding and stale clash of political wills is bankrupting the legitimacy of the CD;

- interpreting the RoP constructively rather than the reverse;

- accepting that active diplomacy amongst the members is urgently required to find mechanisms for re-building long-lost trust and confidence—mechanisms for staggering the attention of the CD on its core issues rather than trying to deal with them simultaneously, mechanisms for developing pre-negotiations on technical issues and matters of definition, etc:

- recognising that the task of restoring confidence requires accepting the realities of the consensus rule while at the same time insulating it from abuse; and

- being always mindful that the advantages of existing as a single (but not sole) multilateral disarmament negotiating forum of the international community will continue to atrophy as negotiations take place elsewhere and the CD’s stature diminishes.

In short, the 'rationality and diplomatic solutions' sought of the CD by the UN Secretary-General at the outset of this year's session remain in urgent need of application.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow
UNIDIR

Nuclear Weapons Prohibition Negotiations

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Fri, 23 Jun 2017 21:13:00 +0000

UNIDIR side-event on 22 June 2017, Conference Room 1, at United Nations Headquarters during negotiations on a Nuclear Weapon Prohibition Treaty:

Remarks by Tim Caughley introducing UNIDIR publication ‘Negotiation of a Nuclear Weapons Prohibition Treaty: Nuts and Bolts of theBan’. The negotiation’s formal title is ‘United Nations Conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading towards their total elimination’.

The first of these two papers deals with a large number—but not all—of the draft articles in the Conference President’s first draft of a nuclear weapon prohibition treaty or convention.

I’m going to use ‘treaty’ and ‘convention’ interchangeably because, as legally-binding agreements or instruments under international law, treaties and conventions have equal legal effect despite views expressed to the contrary during the negotiations: point number one.

Point number two: Since that paper was written and placed on line at the beginning of this session on 15 June 2017, the negotiations in this room have come quite a long way. The paper remains relevant, though, because it focused on the issues rather more than on the wording of the draft treaty.

My third point is about the lens through which we viewed the President’s first draft of the treaty. This, I would describe, as ‘principle meets pragmatism’. Or, as better expressed by Ms Izumi Nakamitsu, the United Nations High Representativefor Disarmament Affairs at the opening of this session of the Conference on 15 June: ‘legally sound, technically accurate, and politically wise’.

This leads me to point number four. The prohibition convention is not intended to provide a comprehensive treatment of verified dismantlement and elimination of nuclear armaments as envisaged in the ‘Model Convention’ put forward in the Conference on Disarmament and United Nations originally 20 years ago by Costa Rica and Malaysia.

Three weeks in which to negotiate a comprehensive agreement would not be nearly enough. There have been occasions during the past few days when I have felt that ambitions voiced here would have been more appropriate to a comprehensive convention than to a mere prohibition. I make this point for two reasons:

- One, to take issue with a related point implicit in some interventions that a credible outcome to these negotiations cannot be achieved in three weeks. It can. A prohibition treaty can be both succinct and aspirational.

- This is related to the second reason. — As was foreshadowed in the President’s first draft—and as has become clearer during these negotiations—a prohibition treaty offers in part a framework of sorts for future developments.

These developments include, for example,

- the addition of protocols (another type of binding agreement) by which nuclear-armed states can join the prohibition convention (as discussed in the second paper of this UNIDIR publication); and

- decisions taken by States Parties at their regular meetings or Review Conferences.

In other words, the treaty can recognize and provide for second generation issues recognizing that as Ireland explained: ‘we cannot see into the future, we can only allow for it’. As UNIDIR notes in our paper, the level of ambition of the treaty needs to be tempered by this reality. Ideally though, matters that are to be left for further treatment will be described as clearly as possible in the final text for the future guidance of States Parties. Nonetheless, the mandate for meetings of States Parties should not be a straitjacket, but contain a reasonable degree of flexibility, a point stressed by Sweden among others.

This leads me to my fifth and sixth points. Point number five is that the preamble will, of, course, provide fundamental context—the treaty’s so-called object and purpose—by way of direction for States Parties down the track. But to me, this does not mean that the Preamble should be the proverbial Christmas tree—all bells and whistles. It should on the contrary be short, succinct and to the point. The clearer it is, the better will be the foundation for dealing with second generation issues,

Relatedly, (point six) the treaty as a whole needs to be very clear about its relationship with other relevant agreements, principally the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and the non-proliferation regime, Nuclear Weapon Free Zone Treaties, and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and its verification arm. The prohibition convention needs to sit comfortably as one among a number of elements leading ultimately to the elimination of nuclear weapons (as contemplated in the title to this conference and the United Nations General Assembly Resolution that established it).

Obviously the NPT, as such a widely subscribed treaty, deserves greatest care in such an act of alignment. This is not only because of its near universal status, but also because of the sensitivity of nuclear weapons-possessing States not party to it to the manner in which the NPT is referenced, for instance, in United Nations General Assembly Resolutions.

In the final analysis, the effectiveness of the prohibition treaty will be measured by its success in eventually securing the commitment of all States not to possess or use nuclear weapons. The prohibition treaty truly needs to provide a framework under which all States are able to join sooner or later thereby preserving the post-dismantlement era as a nuclear weapon free one. And I’ll stop there.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow, UNIDIR

Nuclear Disarmament: Bridging the Gap (1)

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Fri, 12 May 2017 13:48:00 +0000

This is one of two posts of remarks at a side-event organised during the NPT Preparatory Committee Meeting by the HiroshimaPrefecture, UNIDIR and SIPRI on 2 May 2017 in Vienna. One post contains a summary of a paper by Ambassador Paul Meyer (retired) of Canada. The second summarises a paper written by Professor Nick Ritchie of York University, England. Full versions of the papers will appear on UNIDIR’s website.

Begins: In recent years, the debate on nuclear weapons has been dominated by differences over both the pace of disarmament and how to accelerate it. A humanitarian focus on the risks and consequences of a nuclear conflict or an accidental detonation has accentuated the need for taking nuclear disarmament forward. As we know, the means for doing so, however, are highly disputed including amongst the parties to the NPT.

Acutely aware of the humanitarian impacts and risks of nuclear detonations, the Hiroshima Prefecture has been active in canvassing ways to nurture a bridging of the longstanding divide between nuclear weapon-possessing states and non-nuclear weapon states. UNIDIR welcomes the opportunity to work with the Prefecture in this bridge-building role. The first paper of this collaboration between the Hiroshima Prefecture and UNIDIR offers two perspectives aimed at encouraging a greater understanding of points of view that will need to be taken into account if the common goal of the eventual elimination of nuclear armaments is to be achieved.

The first of the two papers was contributed by former Ambassador Paul Meyer of Canada. Ambassador Meyer’s paper notes the perilous nature of the current international security context and inherent proliferation risks in Asia and Europe. He observes also that the inability to convene the conference on the Middle East WMD-free zone that was promised at the 2010 NPTReview Conference has weakened the authority of the NPT, a key bulwark of non-proliferation. Avoiding a reversion to a second cold war or a breakdown in the global non-proliferation regime embodied in that Treaty (or both) will require some dedicated corrective action on the part of nuclear weapon states and non nuclear weapon states alike. This would require:

· a critical assessment of the efficacy of nuclear deterrence;

· a fuller consideration of providing extended deterrence without reliance on nuclear weapons; and

· a determined politico-diplomatic strategy to reinvigorate the global machinery for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament.

His paper considers each of those elements in turn.

Meyer observes that nuclear weapons have been described as ‘the great equalizer’ in contemporary security affairs—that they can be seen as providing a comparatively small state (e.g., North Korea) with a defence against a militarily superior adversary by threatening a devastating blow that would outweigh the benefits that such an adversary could hope to achieve. He notes, however, some limits to the deterrence doctrine and suggests that the assumption that the mere possession of nuclear weapons provides an effective deterrent for the possessing state is not borne out historically.

Meyer writes that proponents of the abolition of nuclear weapons need to consider alternatives to nuclear deterrence in a world still marked by armed conflicts. He notes that the specific military objectives traditionally assigned to nuclear forces are increasingly vulnerable to a new generation of conventional weaponry. Indisputably the road to a world without nuclear weapons will be a long and winding one. It will require the vision to identify a way forward despite the current strategic environment.

Meyer concludes that In the near term the restoration of basic solidarity within the NPT community is a pre-condition for advancing both the goal of transcending reliance on nuclear deterrence and progressing towards a world without nuclear weapons and towards also the non-proliferation imperative that the five nuclear weapon states and their allies prioritise.

In summary, this paper and the accompanying one by Professor Nick Ritchie serve the intended purpose of an initial summarising of perspectives that will need to be understood and recognised in any dialogue to bridge the gap between nuclear and non-nuclear weapon states. The papers both recognise that there are other, competing viewpoints to accommodate. Understanding all positions is essential to accommodating them. Exchanging views on ways and means of reconciling various perspectives on nuclear disarmament will form the basis of further collaboration by UNIDIR and the Hiroshima Prefecture towards bridge building. It is our hope that in the meantime there will develop an increased realisation on all sides that talking to each other needs to replace talking at—or past—each other, that is, understanding the differences first, reconciling them where possible, and concentrating on identifying and building on common ground. Ends

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

UNIDIR

Nuclear Disarmament: Bridging the Gap (2)

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Fri, 12 May 2017 13:46:00 +0000

The second paper was contributed by Professor Nick Ritchie of the University of York. His paper weighs questions about the effectiveness of a treaty prohibiting the possession and use of nuclear weapons (i.e., a ‘ban treaty”). Noting that most of the nuclear-armed nations are currently opposed to such a treaty, along with most of the United States’ nuclear allies, he observes that, ultimately, nuclear disarmament can occur only when the nuclear-possessors have dismantled and disposed of their nuclear weapons in a voluntary process. Nevertheless, actions take place not in a vacuum but in particular political and historical contexts and the chief purpose of the humanitarian initiative and a ban treaty, he sees, as being to change the global political context of nuclear weapons. By ‘political context’ Ritchie is referring to the prevailing set of norms, rules, practices and discourses that shape how we think about and act in relation to nuclear weapons.

Ritchie views the primary changes sought by advocates of a ban treaty as being twofold:

(i) the ‘delegitimation’ and stigmatisation of nuclear weapons based on the risks of nuclear use and the unacceptable humanitarian effects of nuclear violence; and (ii) a shifting of the centre of power in nuclear disarmament diplomacy away from the agency of nuclear-armed states and their relationships with each other and towards the collective agency of non-nuclear-weapon states that foreswore the possession of nuclear arms under the NPT. This shift he attributes to frustration with the slow pace of nuclear disarmament.

In Ritchie’s view, the effect of a stigmatising move by a majority of states would neither be immediate nor direct. A direct effect would require the participation of one or more nuclear-armed states in the negotiation process leading to a strategic decision to disarm and begin a process of dismantling nuclear weapons and production complexes—not something that is currently in prospect. The effect of a ban treaty would therefore be indirect through changing the global context of nuclear weapons by establishing and legitimising a new political reality, and through challenging established ways of thinking about nuclear weapons and security and the relationships and practices that sustain them. He sees the intention of proponents of a ban treaty as being to increase the costs of trying to legitimise nuclear weapons in global politics in order to induce change in the policies and practices of the nuclear-armed. A ban’s impact would be felt as part of a broader set of ‘effective measures’ to develop a universal prohibition regime that will have to include robust verification of demilitarised nuclear programmes.

In summary, this paper and the accompanying one by Ambassador Paul Meyer serve the intended purpose of an initial summarising of perspectives that will need to be understood and recognised in any dialogue to bridge the gap between nuclear and non-nuclear weapon states. The papers both recognise that there are other, competing viewpoints to accommodate. Understanding all positions is essential to accommodating them. Exchanging views on ways and means of reconciling various perspectives on nuclear disarmament will form the basis of further collaboration by UNIDIR and the Hiroshima Prefecture towards bridge building. It is our hope that in the meantime there will develop an increased realisation on all sides that talking to each other needs to replace talking at—or past—each other, that is, understanding the differences first, reconciling them where possible, and concentrating on identifying and building on common ground. Ends

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

UNIDIR

Understanding Nuclear Weapon Risks

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Fri, 07 Apr 2017 14:32:00 +0000

UNIDIR has just published this collection of papers by experts on the nature and causes of nuclear risk. The same experts will be panellists in a risk symposium that will take place at the Palais des Nations on 10 April (see our previous blog).

UNIDIR's Director, Mr Jarmo Sareva, notes in the Foreword to the publication that irrespective of differences in how States perceive nuclear weapons, it is apparent that a closer understanding of the components of risk surrounding the safety and security of nuclear weapons is warranted—with a view to reducing the probability of nuclear detonation events.

Given the enormous lethality of nuclear arms and their potential for global disruption, all States share an interest in prevention, something the President of the International Committee of the Red Cross noted at the 32nd International Conference of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Movement in December 2015.

In 2017, a facts-based discourse that engages the broader international community on reducing nuclear risks has never been more important. This publication and a symposium presenting its findings to multilateral policy practitioners on 10 April are intended to contribute to such dialogue.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow, UNIDIR

Nuclear Weapon Risk Symposium

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Thu, 06 Apr 2017 11:40:00 +0000

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Risks surrounding nuclear armaments—a concern of many UN General Assembly Resolutions over the years—have come under closer scrutiny lately. This can be attributed to increased attention to accidents and near misses involving nuclear weapons and new evidence of the humanitarian consequences of nuclear detonations. The risk profile of the use and possession of nuclear weapons has also been influenced by heightened global instability.

Gauging the level of risk from these and other causes has been the focus of a UNIDIR project that will culminate in a public symposium at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland on Monday 10 April. Keynote addresses from Dr William Perry (former US Secretary for Defense) and Mr Yves Daccord (Director-General of the ICRC) will be followed by discussions involving a range of experts on nuclear risk.

The experts include

Mark Fitzpatrick (Risk and Nuclear Deterrence), with Marc Barnett

Hans M. Kristensen (The Quest For More Useable Nuclear Weapons)

Christine Parthemore (The Unique Risks of Nuclear-Armed Cruise Missiles)

Pavel Podvig (Risks of Nuclear Command and Control Accidents)

Patricia Lewis (Cyber Threats and Nuclear Weapons Systems), with Beyza Unal

Reza Lahidji (The Safety of Nuclear Weapons and Materials: Lessons from the Assessment of Nuclear Power Plant Risks)

Elena K. Sokova (Non-State Actors and Nuclear Weapons)

These experts have already contributed to a UNIDIR publication which, with an introduction and conclusions written by UNIDIR, is being published on www.unidir.org .

The objectives of this project have been two-fold:

1. to shed more light on the nature and cause of nuclear risk, and

2. to extend the conversation on risk as a vehicle for seeking common ground between nuclear-armed and non-nuclear-armed states. Given the magnitude and destructiveness of a nuclear detonation, all states have an interest in managing and reducing risks associated with nuclear armaments for as long as they continue to exist. In addition, there is value in cooperating in areas where risks have yet to fully reveal themselves—cyber, new technologies, increasing automation, etc. Creating a culture of transparency and exchange would serve as means towards more targeted actions in risk reduction while sidestepping current disagreements over the best means of advancing nuclear disarmament.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow, UNIDIR

Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose?

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Fri, 27 Jan 2017 10:58:00 +0000

In an earlier posting on this site, I suggested that the Conference on Disarmament move away from the complicated, multi-mandate annual programmes of work of the past 20 years. It was proposed that in order to get the CD going again, its focus should be substantially narrowed ideally to a single issue. And, the work programme should, as in the distant past, be no more than a schedule of activities for the year.

The current President of the Conference (Ambassador Vierita of Romania) appears to have a similar idea. His ‘initiative’ is to call for the setting up of a working group of the CD with the sole task of taking stock of the progress on all agenda items and possible new areas in order to identify the way ahead. He has invited support from CD members for this approach.

The objective of such a subsidiary body could equally be discharged by the plenary itself, the default mode ordained by article 19 of the CD’s rules of procedure. The President may feel, however, that the exercise of taking stock of progress is more efficiently conducted in the more informal atmosphere of a working group.—The necessary rebuilding of trust and confidence among members after years of bitter disputes over its priorities may be facilitated in such a group. And the initiative sensibly envisages that the chair of the group would be elected for the full session of the Conference rather than rotate monthly like the presidency.

The initiative is not described as a programme of work or a schedule of activities (as will be required under rule 28), although it envisages that the chair of the group would establish a timetable for 2017. Nor is it clear whether members of the public would be able to observe its sessions as they are entitled to do in the case of formal meetings of the CD. These are important details that the President will no doubt wish to clarify over the next week or so during which feedback from member states can be expected.

If the intention of the new proposal is to move away from the unsuccessful multi-mandated approach of the past two decades, it should be taken seriously. Its simplicity is to be welcomed, although in my view its additional idea of also setting up “Informal Thematic Working Groups” adds unnecessary complexity.—Such bodies may indeed prove useful but they can readily be established if and when a demonstrable need emerges and a climate of trust and confidence has been engendered.

At the least, this single-mandate focus could serve as an overdue test of whether members of the CD are serious about overcoming their longstanding deadlock. Passing this test will depend on whether the Conference is not only able to break old habits but also on whether it ensures that such a working group is not just business-as-usual under another procedural guise. In other words, if they pursue the President’s initiative, can members successfully debunk the saying that the more things change, the more they stay the same?

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow, UNIDIR

CD Back to Basics

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Tue, 10 Jan 2017 09:18:00 +0000

As the 2017 session of the Conference on Disarmament (CD) is about to begin (on 23 January), here are 10 points which newcomers to the CD and others might wish to ponder:

1 The agenda of the CD covers some of the world’s most important security issues—nuclear disarmament; prohibiting the production of fissile material for use in nuclear weapons; preventing an arms race in outer space; agreeing on legally-effective means to assure non-nuclear-weapon states that nuclear weapons will not be used against them. These matters are also known as the four core issues of the CD.

2 The CD has made no concrete progress in dealing with these issues (or anything else) since 1996 when the negotiations on the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) were concluded.

3 The CD was established by the UN General Assembly as a negotiating body, not a deliberative (or ‘talk-shop’) forum. It has failed to fulfil its mandate for over 20 years. Its role as a standing body of the international disarmament community has thus atrophied. Disarmament negotiations have found new or alternative negotiating vehicles and institutions—UN General Assembly (Arms Trade Treaty; treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons) and treaty bodies (Anti-Personnel Landmines Convention; Cluster Munitions Convention).

4 In terms of the CD’s failings, the Conference is not under-resourced. It has a budget for 30 hours every week of fully serviced meetings with simultaneous interpretation into the 6 UN languages for 24 weeks a year.

5 And the Conference has ‘workable’ rules of procedures (RoP) that, although somewhat idiosyncratic, have adequately met the needs of the CD (and its predecessors) during successful negotiations of the past (for example, the NPT, ENMOD, Seabed Treaty, BTWC, CWC and the CTBT.)

6 The RoP are workable if the 65 states that are members of the Conference want to get down to work. There are, however, some constraints. As all CD decisions must be taken by consensus, the formal opposition of just one state can block a decision. And every year, work only begins if no state prevents agreement on the proposed schedule of activities for the annual session (the so-called ‘programme of work’). The more complicated the programme of work, the greater the likelihood that one or more states will oppose it. With three very short-lived exceptions (in 1998 (twice) and 2009), no programme of work has secured consensus since the decision in August 1993 on the mandate for the CTBT negotiations (CD/1212).

7 The draft work programmes that have failed to achieve agreement or implementation for two decades now have been unnecessarily complicated. Rather than follow earlier CD practice of simply setting out a schedule of activities for the year ahead, for 20 years the programmes have also incorporated mandates for negotiating or otherwise dealing with all four of the core issues, to zero effect. Such mandates are indispensible, but there is nothing in the rules of procedure that requires them to be set out in the annual work programme.

8 This unfortunate current practice is not just complicated. It has the effect of holding work on any one of the four mandates hostage to each of the other three. A state that blocks consensus on the programme of work because of its opposition to one of the four mandates, prevents work taking place not only on any of the mandates but on the annual schedule of activities embodying the mandates.

9 This extraordinary state of affairs is not an accident. Some members regard it as a symptom of the tense global security environment, which is inhibiting progress on these kinds of issues. If this is so, then the CD should operate merely on an as-needs basis, re-convening only when there is a demonstrable new and promising development. Other states, however, believe that the Conference depends for its existence on being able to make a difference in times of global tension, the more so in the light of the relevance of the four core issues on its agenda. In relation to nuclear disarmament, for example, the words of the previous UN Secretary-General come to mind: “Some may claim that security conditions today are not ripe for the pursuit of further nuclear disarmament. I say this view has it completely backwards. The pursuit of arms control and disarmament is precisely how we can break the tension and reduce conflicts.”

10 After 20 years of empty returns on its annual investment of 24 weeks, the CD’s integrity is dependent on it finally acknowledging either that its impasse is—and is likely to remain—chronic, or that a new beginning is required. If the 2017 session is to arrest the CD’s decline, it should aim for a straightforward, business-like programme of work simply setting out a schedule of activities for the year. That schedule should foreshadow immediate negotiations on an individual core issue (or issues), or an emerging issue, to get the Conference going again. In short, rebuilding confidence and credibility from a less convoluted platform will require going back to the basics of the CD’s heyday. Otherwise, the sense that the Conference has become anachronistic - powerless to make a difference in addressing today’s international security challenges, may intensify.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

UNIDIR

UNIDIR Newsletter

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 24 Oct 2016 09:07:00 +0000

Readers of this site are, we hope, on UNIDIR’s circulation list for the Institute’s Newsletter, a monthly update that advises of upcoming events and recent publications. If you would like to receive this handy update, please enter your email details at UNIDIRNewsletter.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

Nuclear disarmament: OEWG: recent comment

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 24 Oct 2016 09:06:00 +0000

UNIDIR recently published a background paper on the 2016 Open-ended Working Group (OEWG).

The paper was launched at a side-event during the 71^st United Nations General Assembly. The event was organised by Thailand, co-sponsored by Indonesia, Malaysia, THE Philippines and Vietnam, with assistance from UNIDIR.

The proceedings of that event, including comments made by UNIDIR, will shortly be posted on UNIDIR’s website.

Tim Caughley
Resident Senior Fellow

Nuclear disarmament: Verification: recent publication

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 24 Oct 2016 09:06:00 +0000

VERIFICATION PUBLICATION: OVERVIEW

At a side-event organised by Norway during the 71st United Nations General Assembly in New York, UNIDIR introduced its most recent publication on verifying the elimination of nuclear weapons as follows:

I am grateful to Norway—a longstanding, valued supporter of UNIDIR—for inviting me to participate on this panel. It is also a pleasure to have this early opportunity to draw attention to a paper on verification published very recently by UNIDIR. This publication is the result of a project funded by the Government of New Zealand, and can be found on UNIDIR’s website www.unidir.org.

Possible measures and processes for making progress on nuclear disarmament are receiving increasing attention in multilateral diplomacy, notably in the 2016 Open-ended Working Group and in the current session of the UN General Assembly. Irrespective of how nuclear disarmament progress is made—and there are many views about that—one thing is universally recognised. It is that along the path to eliminating nuclear weapons, possessors and non-possessors of those armaments will have to develop and agree on various means of verifying the destruction of nuclear armaments and prohibiting future existence of them and the fissile material that they contain.

The rationale for UNIDIR’s latest project on verification had two strands. The first, as just mentioned, is that no matter by what process states decide to take nuclear disarmament forward, mechanisms will at some point be required to verify the destruction of nuclear armaments and their components. It goes without saying that nuclear-armed states cannot simply be dispossessed of their nuclear armaments against their will. However committed they may become to a world without nuclear armaments, their views will be integral to the success of negotiations on how to eliminate their arsenals, and they will have to consent to the outcome.

Second, the inevitable need in due course for verification mechanisms for nuclear weapon elimination is widely appreciated. It is also broadly understood that negotiating those mechanisms is likely to be complex and militarily and politically sensitive. The problems surrounding the launch of negotiations just to ban fissile material production bears witness to that. In these circumstances, we believed that there was scope to carry out a survey of verification experience, precedents and tools on which the international community will be able to draw for taking that particular element of nuclear disarmament forward.

The objective of this survey is to provide a general overview of past and present verification activities and proposals relevant to the elimination of nuclear weapons. We have looked beyond the current debate on nuclear disarmament towards the development of the mechanisms required to provide assurances that a nuclear-weapon-free world could be achieved and maintained. Reaching these objectives will be challenging, but, as our paper shows, feasible. I refer to chapter 4 of the paper in this regard. And incidentally, the paper mentions pre-negotiation confidence-building work such as that of the Group of Scientific Experts that is the subject of the next presentation.

This survey also explains what is meant by ‘verification’ and outlines the role that verification mechanisms are intended to play in ensuring that international obligations are fulfilled. By way of possible analogy with verifying the destruction of nuclear weapons, we summarize existing verification commitments of relevance including those contained in treaties covering the two other categories of weapons of mass destruction (biological and chemical weapons). The part played by international organisations in promoting states’ adherence to these obligations, and in trying to hold them to account if they fail to do so, is also covered.

In addition, this overview identifies a range of initiatives by states, civil society, and academic and other specialist institutions such as VERTIC (also represented on this panel) that can be seen as preparing the ground for future negotiations on verification mechanisms for nuclear disarmament. For instance, we have drawn attention to the United Kingdom-Norway Initiative on dismantlement verification that began in 2007—the pioneering project that brought together a nuclear-weapon state and a non-nuclear-weapon state to collaborate on verification issues. It is significant that Norway and the UK believe that there are no a priori legal barriers, such as NPT obligations, to collaboration between nuclear-weapon states and non-nuclear-weapon states.

The paper surveys the verification landscape as a kind of stocktake. It does not, however, delve into technical aspects of verification or what the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI) has characterised as ‘nuclear forensic analysis’. But it does draw on such initiatives, analogies and precedents to highlight key political and legal challenges to be overcome by the international community in order to provide assurance that obligations to remove nuclear weapons from military arsenals can be verified in practice. The paper was published just before Norway tabled a resolution on verification in First Committee, and I would like to commend Norway also for that initiative. It has already attracted an impressive number of co-sponsors.

In conclusion, the complexity and nature of political and military sensitivities around nuclear disarmament verification should not be under-estimated. Nevertheless, as surveyed in UNIDIR’s paper, serious efforts are already being made to understand, address and overcome those sensitivities at a practical level. The experience of existing verification organisations will also be a valuable source. Ultimately, however, the effectiveness of mechanisms that verify the elimination of nuclear weapons will depend on the collective will of the international community to achieve a world without nuclear weapons.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

Nuclear disarmament: Verification: recent survey

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 24 Oct 2016 09:02:00 +0000

VERIFICATION SURVEY

UNIDIR recently published a survey on activities, studies and precedents relevant to a consideration of the mechanisms that will in due course be needed to verify the elimination of nuclear weapons and their components.

Attention was drawn to that paper at a side-event organised by Norway during the 71^st United Nations General Assembly in New York. UNIDIR’s summary of its contents can be found at in an earlier posting on this site.

New Zealand, the funder of the project which produced the publication, also drew attention to the paper at a side-event on ‘Effective Measures for Nuclear Disarmament’ on 17 October 2016. Verification will be among the most crucial measures needed for the effective elimination of nuclear weapons and ultimate maintenance of a world free of nuclear weapons.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

Nuclear disarmament: Risk: New Project

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 24 Oct 2016 08:58:00 +0000

The facts-based discourse on the humanitarian consequences of detonation of nuclear weapons has since 2010 drawn increasing attention to the need to better understand the causes and level of risk surrounding those armaments. Developments in this discourse include three international conferences on humanitarian impacts of nuclear weapons, various published studies on particular aspects of risk such as close calls, nuclear-weapons arsenals on high-alert, challenges for humanitarian response, and systems accidents, as well as public revelations about safety lapses.

To date policy attention has predominantly focused on understanding the consequences of nuclear weapon detonation events. Yet there is growing recognition that the causes and level of nuclear weapons risk warrant closer scrutiny. In December 2015 the ICRC President said that that greater policy exploration of nuclear weapons risk would allow issues around these weapons to be considered in a different way, and so be especially helpful for constructive engagement with nuclear-weapon-possessor states.

Related to this, in 2015 the UN General Assembly established an open-ended working group (OEWG) to discuss (among other things) transparency measures related to the risks associated with nuclear weapons and measures to reduce and eliminate the risk of accidental, mistaken, unauthorized or intentional nuclear weapon detonations. In addition, the OEWG was tasked to consider the need for measures to increase awareness and understanding of the complexity of and interrelationship between the wide range of humanitarian consequences of a nuclear detonation.

The tenor of the OEWG discussions during 2016 suggests that to extend policy understanding of nuclear risk, further research and engagement will be required, both to detail the risk ‘picture’ and to communicate these findings to the disarmament community. Greater policy exploration of nuclear weapons risk will allow issues relating to these arms to be better understood, facilitating constructive engagement with nuclear-weapon-possessor states.

UNIDIR’s ‘Causes of Nuclear Risk’ project aims to address issues of risk surrounding nuclear weapons through specially commissioned papers and meetings devoted to this theme organised in collaboration with relevant institutions. The Institute’s website www.unidir.org will draw further attention to those papers and meetings over the next six months.

Tim Caughley
Resident Senior Fellow

[photograph: Reflections - United Nations Headquarters Building, New York]

Security and Nuclear Disarmament

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Thu, 04 Aug 2016 15:22:00 +0000

A foundation of global strategic stability is regarded by a number of states as a prerequisite for progress on nuclear disarmament. In today’s troubled world, efforts to achieve such progress are seen as misguided, if not futile.

An alternative view is that the continuing existence of high numbers of nuclear weapons is a factor that contributes to the unsettled security environment. This perspective draws on a range of concerns about possessors of nuclear weapons—stalled efforts to reduce nuclear arsenals, increased investment in modernising those arsenals, apparent readiness of leaders or aspiring leaders to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons, and so on. Compounding this situation is the absence of trust between nuclear-weapon possessors and non-possessors and the abdication of responsibility by the Conference on Disarmament for negotiating on nuclear disarmament (and other) issues.

Proponents of these positions will be at loggerheads this month in the UN General Assembly-mandated Open-ended Working Group on taking nuclear disarmament forward (OEWG). The OEWG will conclude its work on 19 August and account for itself to the UNGA in October. Its respected chair Ambassador Thani Thongphakdi of Thailand has already circulated a draft report for the OEWG’s consideration.

Meanwhile, the beleaguered Conference of Disarmament gears itself up for making its own report to the UNGA. By the way, it is curious that some of those states that see the current international security environment as being unfavourable for progress on nuclear disarmament remain hopeful that the CD can in the same security situation nonetheless overcome its 20-year deadlock over how to negotiate issues of comparable strategic complexity.

In any event, perhaps in proposing a new topic (see our previous post), Russia is trying to get the Conference to side-step this impasse and turn instead to an issue of common concern—i.e., terrorism (in Russia’s proposal, relating specifically to acts of chemical and biological terrorism).

Another comparatively neutral option for the CD is to re-examine its ‘working methods’. For example, the idea of extending the one-month term of the CD’s rotating presidency has been put forward. But this would be a non-issue if the CD were actually in negotiating mode. This is because the chair of those negotiations would effectively become the CD’s power-broker. The Conference president would then become largely symbolic for the duration of the negotiations. The term of the negotiating chair, unlike the CD president’s, need not be confined to a single month.

Whether or not events this August in the CD will shape that body’s future and to what extent the course of negotiations on nuclear disarmament will be forged in the OEWG remain to be seen. But one thing is certain: the outcomes and their security ramifications will both be aired fully in the UN General Assembly later this year.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

The CD – some stirrings?

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 04 Jul 2016 13:38:00 +0000

The Conference on Disarmament (CD) has just concluded its second session. It will resume on 2 August for its final 7 weeks for 2016.

The CD remains in the grip of its 20-year paralysis. There have, however, been several twitches of life this year. Draft programmes of work tabled by the Russian Federation and the United Kingdom have in different ways challenged the Conference to rethink the manner in which it might best approach its responsibilities as a negotiating forum. (The last time the CD exercised that role was in 1996 when developing a comprehensive testban.)

By way of an additional topic to the perennial four ‘core’ issues on which the CD has long been blocked, Russia proposed negotiations on elements of a treaty for the suppression of acts of chemical terrorism. This new topic hasn’t broken the log-jam but it has caused some soul-searching as to what the Conference might usefully take up if progress on the core issues remains elusive.

The United Kingdom took a more radical approach. Rather than repeating the CD’s stubborn, two-decades-long approach of trying to set up a working group for each of the four core issues, the UK proposed that there be just one such group. Its ostensible focus would be nuclear disarmament, one of the four core issues (the others being fissile material, negative security assurances and outer space).

Single-mandate proposals like the British one are a welcome echo of the good old days of the CD (pre-1996). So too, are work programmes that are cast in part at least as a schedule of activities. In more productive days, the work programme was no more than a schedule of activities, allowing real work – the development of a negotiating mandate – to get underway at the beginning of the annual session.

Whether the CD is seeing the possible beginnings of a return to better habits of the distant past is too early to say. Russia has yet to convince all CD members that its proposal is an appropriate topic for the Conference. The UK has yet to convince all members that the proposed mandate is truly a negotiating one and not a duplication of the discussion mandate of the current UN General Assembly’s Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) on nuclear disarmament. Time will tell.

One final point concerns the vexed issue of CD v. OEWG. Given the emergence of forums such as OEWGs and GGEs dealing with issues in parallel to those on the CD’s agenda, some debate has arisen about the Conference’s true role. This comes down to recognising the difference between “single” and “sole” negotiating body?

“Sole” has come to be used as though the CD were the only legitimate multilateral disarmament negotiating forum. However, UNSSOD1’s use of the words “a single negotiating body” was intended to mean something else. What the General Assembly had in mind was that the CD would be a standing body, a single - as opposed to the sole - forum.

That is, it would be a standing institution to which key disarmament issues could be brought and negotiated by key states as needs arose (assuming the necessary consensus). It was seen as more effective and efficient to support a single establishment and maintain a single repository of knowledge and expertise than to take up disarmament issues, one by one, in an ad hoc manner. Not an exclusive forum for disarmament negotiations, but a convenient, pre-existing, readily resourced one.

That point may seem esoteric, but in any event competition breeds innovation. In the CD’s case, the signs of some re-invention may slowly be emerging, if the Russian and UK proposals are anything to go by.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

Hiroshima in the news

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 06 Jun 2016 07:34:00 +0000

These are comments made by UNIDIR Fellow, Tim Caughley, at a Public Meeting organised by UNITAR at the Hiroshima International Conference Centre, Japan, on 1 June 2016

Future perspectives for nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation.

The immediate future for multilateral nuclear disarmament is difficult to predict. There are only two certainties. The first is that the global security environment will remain a complicating factor for making real progress on nuclear disarmament. The second is that a new review cycle for the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) will begin in May 2017, building up to 2020 and the 50^th anniversary of entry-into-force of the treaty that year. It can confidently be said that of the three pillars of the NPT all parties retain a strong interest in sustaining two of them, the proliferation and peaceful use pillars. However, efforts to agree effective measures for shoring up the shaky third pillar—on nuclear disarmament—are, for the meantime, taking place in a parallel forum, an Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) established by the UN General Assembly. Those efforts are intensifying despite—or perhaps because of—the highly unsettled international security environment.

For the rest, the future can only be a matter of further speculation:

1. In the NPT review, what will be the attitude of nuclear-weapon states (NWS) to the sharpening focus on the nuclear disarmament pillar of the NPT in the OEWG?

2. And in the immediate future, what will be the outcome of the work of the OEWG when it meets again this August to agree its report and make recommendations to the 71^st session of the UN General Assembly?

3. Equally, what will be the outcomes of any initiatives in the General Assembly this October to reconvene the OEWG or any other new group or negotiation that may be set up by UNGA71?

4. For instance, will UNGA71 agree on a new process stemming from one or other of two proposals made during the OEWG’s May for negotiations on a prohibition of nuclear weapons. One proposal was tabled by the entire group of Latin American and Caribbean states (CELAC). The other came from a cross-regional group (including 3 states from this region [i.e., Asia])?

5. Will states that do not support such a negotiation participate in it? The dynamic that might unfold could take this form: there could be pressure from nuclear-weapons states on their allies and friends not to participate. On the other hand, there would be pressure from civil society on non-nuclear weapon states, including those that are allied to NWS, to attend and to press for a prohibition even if the NWS did not participate.

In any event, future perspectives are necessarily of a speculative nature at this stage.

Answers to pre-submitted questions covered the following points during the Hiroshima public meeting:

The latest meeting of the OEWG took place in May 2016. What is the significance of these sessions?

The significance lies in the fact that are taking place:

i) under UNGA rules of procedure (in which voting can occur if consensus is absent);

ii) in parallel to forums that have proved to be either blocked (Conference on Disarmament) or unproductive (NPT) and which both operate under the consensus rule for the taking of decisions.

As well as being able to take decisions by voting, the conduct of the meetings is more informal and flexible than the CD and the NPT. For instance, interactivity – i.e., an actual exchange of views or debate – is strongly encouraged. Civil society participates actively. The chair arranges experts to make presentations in order to stimulate debate.

How is the OEWG contributing to nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation?

The OEWG is providing a forum in which all states are able to participate alongside intergovernmental organisations and civil society unlike the CD (65 members) and the NPT (which doesn’t include nuclear armed states, the DPRK, India, Israel and Pakistan).

What are the limitations and opportunities of these Open Ended Working Group meetings?

Limitations have resulted because the nuclear armed states have chosen not to participate, leaving the defence of nuclear weapons possession and the stationing of US nuclear weapons on the territories of some NATO allies to states under the nuclear ‘umbrella’. The opportunity for a direct expression of views from the weapon states themselves is an important missing ingredient.

Opportunities stem from the ability for civil society to be heard and to contribute to the debate.

How do milestones such as the visits to Hiroshima by the US President and US Secretary of State affect nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation? Do these visits help promote this issue?

The visits have various symbolic impacts, especially President Obama’s as the first serving US President to come to Hiroshima since the dropping of the atomic bomb. The visits affect nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation by their recognition of the unique impacts of a nuclear weapon on civilians (as opposed to conventional bombing), an impact wreaked by a single weapon rather than hundreds of conventional ones, an impact which is indiscriminate and, because of radio-activity, goes on killing people and affecting the health of survivors long after the explosion. It is impossible to imagine that visitors would not be affected by their visit to Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but with the aging of hibakusha (affected survivors) it will be left to all of us to honour their testimony and to press for a nuclear weapon free world.

What can be done to achieve a break-through for a world without nuclear weapons? What else could the people of Hiroshima do to promote nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation?

A nuclear weapon detonation, especially an exchange of nuclear weapons between enemies, will not respect national boundaries. And the risks of a damaging accident are difficult to calculate but are greater than zero. Therefore, everyone has a stake in nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation. A break-through will require much wider public understanding that the health, safety and security of everyone is at stake. The hibakusha and other people of Hiroshima can continue with their moving efforts to remind us all of the horrific and lasting impacts of a nuclear weapon.

Tim Caughley

UNIDIR

Nuclear Disarmament: Humanitarian Consequences: OEWG

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Tue, 01 Mar 2016 11:05:00 +0000

Dr. John Borrie, UNIDIR’s Chief of Research, made a presentation on 26 February to the Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) which is meeting in Geneva this year.

The presentation was entitled: 'Measures to increase awareness and understanding of the complexity of and interrelationship between the wide range of humanitarian consequences that would result from any nuclear detonation’.

The text of the presentation can be found on the OEWG's website via this link.

The OEWG was established by the United Nations General Assembly for the purpose of ‘taking forward multilateral nuclear disarmament negotiations’. It opened in Geneva on 22 February. Its next session begins in Geneva on 2 May.

Tim Caughley
Resident Senior Fellow

Nuclear disarmament: New UNIDIR/ILPI Study

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Mon, 29 Feb 2016 09:56:00 +0000

This study by UNIDIR and ILPI surveys the existing legal framework regulating nuclear weapons internationally, and assesses the scope and parameters of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), nuclear-weapon-free zones (NWFZ) and international humanitarian law (IHL).

It considers whether a nuclear weapons prohibition or ban treaty—the most recent approach to attract attention in the nuclear disarmament debate—could enhance the current nuclear weapons control regime.

In an effort to situate the notion of a prohibition within the existing multilateral debate on how best to eliminate nuclear weapons, the study identifies and discusses four distinct, but not mutually exclusive, approaches:

- A ‘comprehensive’ approach,

- A ‘framework’ approach,

- A ‘step-by-step’ or ‘building blocks’ approach, and

- A prohibition or ban treaty.

The study addresses ambiguities and overlaps among these means for advancing nuclear disarmament.

The study also analyses legal provisions that could be covered in a prohibition. These might include prohibitions on use, development and testing, manufacturing and production, transfer, transit, stationing and deployment, possession and stockpiling, assistance in the commission of prohibited acts and inducement or encouragement. Additional provisions could establish obligations related to stockpile destruction, safeguards, transparency and reporting, other compliance mechanisms, cooperation and assistance as well as national implementation measures.

The study attracted considerable attention during the recent meetings of the Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) on nuclear disarmament. As well as being available on line, hard copies can be obtained from UNIDIR in the Palais des Nations, room A516.

Nuclear Disarmament: OEWG

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Fri, 26 Feb 2016 08:48:00 +0000

The 2016 Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) established by the United Nations General Assembly for the purpose of ‘taking forward multilateral nuclear disarmament negotiations’ opened in Geneva on 22 February. The text of remarks made by UNIDIR during the opening session of the OEWG have been posted (in two parts) on the joint UNIDIR/ILPI website, ‘Effective Measures’.

The links are:

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=460

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=463

The remarks were made by way of introduction to OEWG Brief no. 2, a paper prepared by UNIDIR as background for participants in the OEWG.

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

UNIDIR

Nuclear disarmament: 2016 Open-ended Working Group

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Thu, 18 Feb 2016 12:49:00 +0000

The 2016 Open-ended Working Group (OEWG) is the result of a resolution tabled in the First Committee of the seventieth United Nations General Assembly in October 2015. The resolution, entitled ‘Taking forward multilateral nuclear disarmament negotiations’ (A/C.1/70/L.13/Rev.1), proposed the establishment of a working group open to participation by all United Nations Member States. Participation is also open to international organisations and civil society representatives.

In a vote in the First Committee, the resolution passed by 135 in favour, to 12 against, with 33 abstentions. In the subsequent vote by the General Assembly itself, 138 votes were cast in support of the resolution (A/RES/70/33) with 12 against. There were 34 abstentions. The OEWG is meeting in Geneva for a total of 15 days during the period 22 February to 24 August under the likely chairmanship of Ambassador Thani Thongphakdi of Thailand.

OEWG Brief no. 2, a paper prepared by UNIDIR as background for participants in the OEWG, can be found on UNIDIR's website.

That paper surveys the nuclear disarmament landscape and updates an earlier publication that UNIDIR prepared for an OEWG that met in 2013.

Tim Caughley
Resident Senior Fellow

Update on effective measures for nuclear disarmament

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Thu, 19 Nov 2015 16:32:00 +0000

A new posting in the series of comments on 'effective measures' for nuclear disarmament (envisaged in article VI of the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT)) can be found on the joint UNIDIR/ILPI site.

Our intention is to stimulate discussion on a possible way forward for overcoming the current stand-off on multilateral nuclear disarmament.

A recipe - and a venue - for convening some form of exploratory talks needs to be found. Could the recent Explanation of Vote in the First Committee of the UN General Assembly by the five NPT nuclear-weapons possessing states provide such an opening?

Tim Caughley
Resident Senior Fellow

“Comprehensive and Balanced”: Sink or Swim

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Thu, 27 Aug 2015 07:48:00 +0000

The report (CD/2033) of the chair of the Conference of Disarmament’s informal working group on the vexed question of the CD’s programme of work is commendably concise. Perhaps too concise. One of its conclusions appears to run together a number of separate issues.

The text in question says this: “The focus on the core agenda items should remain as a priority in order to find a consensus formula for a comprehensive and balanced programme of work” (paragraph 6 (a)). Let’s break this down in terms of the CD’s rules of procedure:

- The four core issues will require—if negotiations on each of them are to be undertaken—negotiating mandates individually or collectively.

- But there is no requirement that those mandates be incorporated in the programme of work.

- Nor is there any requirement that the programme of work be “comprehensive and balanced”. This is simply code for linking all four negotiating mandates together so that none is agreed until all are agreed (in the time-honoured way of multilateral diplomacy).

The Conference is making things very hard for itself in the following ways:

- Its programme of work need be no more than a schedule of activities.

- The negotiation of mandates can simply be listed as an item on that schedule, with an appropriate allocation of time.

- Lumping together the four core issues (dealing with nuclear disarmament, a fissile material ban, preventing an arms race in outer space, and multilaterally agreed negative security assurances) constitutes a hugely indigestible feast of work. Even if negotiating mandates on those topics can be agreed, imagine the difficulty of finding consensus on the sequence in which they should be negotiated. Negotiating them more or less simultaneously would be beyond the means of all but the largest delegations.

A short look at the history of the CD (repeated from earlier posts on this site) puts this mis-application of the rules of procedure in context:

The Rules of Procedure, as well as CD/1036 (a decision on the “Improved and Effective Functioning” of the Conference adopted on 21 August 1990), envisage a streamlined approach whereby the programme of work would be no more than a mere schedule of business rather than an overarching mandate or mandates for beginning to elaborate a treaty or a politically binding text on one or more of the core issues.

Decision CD/1036 led to the current rule on the work programme, rule 28, with its emphasis on establishing rather than adopting. This is not a matter of semantics. It means that having established through his or her consultations that no reasonable objection exists to the schedule of business (i.e., work programme) for the year, the Conference president would get work underway without a formal decision. In theory, the work programme, shorn of mandates, would be so simple as not to require a formal, consensus decision of the Conference. It would be wiser, however, to establish formally by a decision of the CD that there was no objection to this course of action (i.e., consensus).

Returning to successful approaches prior to 1999 would involve the following:

1. In the opening days of the annual session, there would be an allocation of time to be spent on each of the 4 core issues and other substantive agenda items. That schedule or timetable would also allocate space for the annual high-level segment and for agreeing the CD’s report to the UN General Assembly. In addition, it would reserve time for discussion of the outcomes of its work especially on mandates.

2. In the course of its work on the core issues, the central matter for CD members to resolve would be: under rule 23 of the Rules of Procedure, is there a need to establish a subsidiary body in which engagement would be intensified? That is, does a basis exist for the negotiation of “a draft treaty or other draft texts”? Note that a subsidiary body is generally regarded as being more appropriate for facilitating intense engagement than the comparatively stilted, formal option of conducting work in plenary, although under the Rules, plenary meetings are the default option.

3. As, when and if the questions arising under rule 23 are answered in the affirmative, members would immediately apportion time from the reserved allocation (see 1. above) for the negotiation of the necessary mandate(s).

4. Agreement on the negotiated mandates would require consensus. For so long as Members insist on linkages among the four core issues, agreement on mandates is most unlikely to be achieved individually. The timetable would need to be flexible enough to deal with the reality that a package deal would thus need to be developed.

The key difference from the present situation is that work on the mandates would be taking place under an agreed, streamlined work programme within the rules constituting a schedule of activities shorn of negotiating mandates. With the work progamme blockage removed, the beginnings of a basis of trust might be regenerated. The focus would turn to determining whether a basis exists for developing a negotiating mandate, issue by issue, and hence for setting up subsidiary bodies and tackling issues of substance rather than procedure. The CD’s sense of purpose as a negotiating body would be restored.

It remains to be seen, however, whether the weight of a linked set of negotiating mandates will ultimately sink the Conference. There is a way, however, if there’s a will…

Tim Caughley

Resident Senior Fellow

70 years after Hiroshima and Nagasaki

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Thu, 06 Aug 2015 13:05:00 +0000

Commemorating the 70th anniversary of the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is the subject of a posting written on the joint site that UNIDIR shares with ILPI, called 'Effective Measures'. Readers who may be interested in the latest posting are invited to go to

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=376

Effective measures for nuclear disarmament—an update

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Tue, 14 Jul 2015 15:22:00 +0000

Readers of our regular posts on 'effective measures' will be aware that our aim is to explore the obligation on states that are party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) to

'pursue negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to ... nuclear disarmament'.

The inability of the 5 year NPT Review Conference this May to achieve any agreed outcome has meant that the duty to conduct those negotiations amongst parties remains unfulfilled 45 years after the treaty entered into force.

This is an extract from the most recent posting on the joint UNIDIR/ILPI site entitled 'Where are we on effective measures, and where are we going?': -

"We have ... come to see the idea of a nuclear weapon ban treaty as one of the most promising potential avenues for effective measures for nuclear disarmament, although of course it is not without its risks and drawbacks. Over the coming months, we’ll reflect further on the pros and cons of such an approach, and we’ll be presenting our analysis later in 2015, both on [the Effective Measures] blog and in other products. How strong really are the arguments for such a treaty, and how serious are the counter-arguments against it given the range of realistic alternatives? For that matter, how realistic is such a treaty in the current international security environment—what would its value be? What could its legal architecture look like? And how would states get there?"

These are issue that we plan to tease out in depth after the northern summer break.

Tim Caughley

NPT Review Conference: the problem pillar

noreply@blogger.com (Disarmament Insight) — Tue, 26 May 2015 14:17:00 +0000

In addition to recent postings here about various blockages in the path of multilateral nuclear disarmament negotiations, you may wish to visit a site on which UNIDIR and ILPI are currently collaborating - a.k.a. effectivemeasures.

The purpose of that work is to offer insights into practical ways of facilitating nuclear disarmament.

The latest comment can be found at: http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=339

Other postings in May of relevance to the recently-concluded NPT Review Conference are:

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=328

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=320

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=309

http://unidir.ilpi.org/?p=292

Separately, John Borrie of UNIDIR has continued to offer insights into the risks of accidents with nuclear weapons: see his latest personal remarks on:

http://www.chathamhouse.org/expert/comment/17739#

Tim Caughley
Resident Senior Fellow