24 January 2007

At its second plenary meeting on Wednesday, January 24, the Conference on Disarmament (CD) agreed to an Organizational Framework for the year prepared by the six presidents of 2007 (South Africa, Sri Lanka, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and Syria, or the P6). This Framework sets up a schedule of activities for the year and designates Coordinators to chair work on each of the seven agenda items. The Conference adopted the agenda in the same session. Japan, the European Union (EU) in a statement delivered by Germany,France, Kenya, Italy, Indonesia, the Republic of Korea, Egypt, Australia, China, South Africa, Syria, India, and Morocco delivered general statements, and Iran, North Korea, and the EU (delivered by Germany) exercised their right of reply.

The Organizational Framework: the 2007 CD's schedule of activities
Building on the 2006 timetable of substantive work created by the 2006 P6, the CD agreed to the Organizational Framework put forward by the 2007 P6. This Framework sets out a general schedule for the CD's discussions, and appoints a Coordinator to each of the seven CD agenda items. During the first ten week session of the CD, governments will cover each agenda item twice by repeating the following process: in numeric order, they will debate two agenda items per week, with three informal sessions and one formal session devoted to each agenda item. In the last week of the first session, they will evaluate this process in order to construct their second session according to progress in the first set of debates. The first six weeks of the seven week second session are open to work on any issues on which the Conference agrees it can make progress. The CD will again evaluate its work in the last week of the second session in order to prepare a schedule of work for the third session. The first three weeks of the third session are again open, followed by one week of evaluation and three weeks for final statements and preparation of the report to the General Assembly.

In addition to leaving more space for focused work, the Organizational Framework also builds on last year's “Friends of the Presidents” by designating Coordinators for each of the seven agenda items. According to South Africa, the Coordinators “will arrange and chair deliberations dealing with the agenda items in a comprehensive manner without preconditions, bearing in mind all relevant views and proposals, past, present and future.” These Coordinators will report to the P6, who appointed them. They are as follows:

-Ambassador Wegger Strommen of Norway for agenda item 1, entitled “cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament”;

-Ambassador Carlo Trezza of Italy for agenda item 2, entitled “prevention of nuclear war, including all related matters”;

-Ambassador Paul Meyer of Canada for agenda item 3, entitled “prevention of an arms race in outer space”;

-Ambassador Carlos Paranhos of Brazil for agenda item 4, entitled “effective international arrangements to assure non-nuclear-weapon States against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons”;

-Ambassador Petko Draganov of Bulgaria for agenda item 5, entitled “new types of weapons of mass destruction and new systems of such weapons, including radiological weapons”;

-Ambassador Makarim Wibisono of Indonesia for agenda item 6, entitled “comprehensive programme of disarmament”; and

-Ambassador John Ducan of the United Kingdom for agenda item 7, entitled “transparency in armaments”.

Because the CD has appointed Special Coordinators in the past to chair deliberations and negotiations, governments sometimes get nervous that using the term “Coordinator” denotes some sort of endorsement or work mandate. Italy reminded the CD that it is allowed to create ad hoc subcommittees, working groups, technical groups or groups of governmental experts, and that the CD presidents have a wide range of discretion in the matter. Algeria, India, Morocco and Iran clarified that they understood that the P6, and not the CD as a whole, had appointed these Coordinators, which South Africa confirmed. Other delegations commended the Coordinators' appointment, including Egypt, which welcomed their appointment and offered its full assistance and support.

This Framework is the compromise between those that prefer to pay equal attention to all agenda items and those that prefer to focus on agenda items they see as moving more quickly than others. Ambassador Mshtali of South Africa eked out this is a delicate balance through months of intensive consultations, and deserved all the praise paid to her in the session. The EU, in a statement delivered by Germany's Deputy Commissioner for Arms Control and Disarmament, Ambassador Rudiger Ludeking, “particularly commend[ed] the meticulous way in which [Ambassador Mshtali] gathered the view of every single CD-member state and managed to merge all these views into a coherent Organizational Framework”. Governments also praised the Organizational Framework's balance and openness. Japan was convinced that if Member States worked actively, the Organizational Framework could facilitate the CD forming international disarmament and non-proliferation norms this year.

The Coordinators will be chairing the deliberations on each subject, and will hopefully give more detailed schedules to the CD next week. In looking forward, the Republic of Korea encouraged the Coordinators to circulate these as soon as possible, and to include indicative lists of sub-topics so that member states could prepare for interactive, focused discussions and potentially invite experts from capital.

The Agenda
The CD also adopted its annual agenda, called the decalogue, with the same Presidential statement as in 2006, “that if there is a consensus in the Conference to deal with any issues, they could be dealt with within this agenda.” Similar to Monday's session, most CD members supported the agenda, calling it “flexible”, “inclusive” and broad enough to encompass all of today's security concerns. Francereiterated its reservations that the agenda was outdated but agreed to join the consensus to facilitate agreement on the “excellent” Organizational Framework. Neither Israel nor Syria, both of whom purportedly toyed with the possibility of adding countering-balancing items to the current agenda (arms transfers to terrorists and arms transfers to state terrorists, respectively), objected to keeping the agenda as is.

Acknowledging the work of NGOs
Although the Women's International League for Peace and Freedom has been delivering a statement to the CD on International Women's Day on behalf of NGOs for over 20 years, we have yet to be able to deliver the statement ourselves. Last year, the president of the Conference read the NGO statement, and asked the Friends of the President to find the best applicable practice for more constructive engagement of civil society, taking into account the practices in other fora, and report on their findings at the end of the year. At this session, Italy, one of the Friends, said, “we also believe that some steps forward could be made to acknowledge the attention and contribution that NGOs present in Geneva contribute to our deliberations.” In reminding the CD of its responsibility to eliminate nuclear weapons, Egypt insisted the CD “listen to the majority of states, international organizations, non-governmental organizations, and civil society which warn of the dangers that nuclear weapons pose to international peace and security.”

Other Issues
The lengthy EU statement delivered by a high-ranking member German official elicited several responses from other CD members. Although the statement did not express any new EU positions, Iran, North Korea and China all responded to portions of the statement. Responding to the EU's stated concerns over Iran's nuclear program and promise to ensure implementation of Security Council Resolution 1737, Iran replied that due to the technicalities of the case, the CD was an inappropriate venue in which to address the issue. North Korea responded to the EU's condemnation of its missile tests and nuclear test by reiterating its rejection of Security Council resolutions and characterizing itself as a victim of US aggression in a environment ruled by the law of the jungle. Germany, on behalf of the EU, used its right of reply to respond to these replies, saying it was concerned about the integrity of the NPT and scolding North Korea that upholding international law was a better way to combat the law of the jungle. China then also responded to the EU statement's criticism of China's recent anti-satellite test, quoting its initial position that the test was not aimed at, nor posed a threat to, any country, and reiterated its commitment to work in the CD to prevent an arms race in outer space. At this point, the Secretary-General of the Conference intervened and implored those involved in rights of reply to focus on issues the CD could solve and maintain a positive atmosphere for CD negotiations. Although North Korea was still compelled to reply “against [its] will”, Iran truncated a longer response by asking the CD “who started it”. When Germany used another right of reply to say these issues were relevant to the CD and of international concern, Iran read out its longer right of reply, reminding the Conference that Iran's position should be seen in a larger historic context of Western and Security Council discrimination against, restrictions on, and interference in Iran.

In a more positive detour, Indonesia announced that it recently approved its ratification of the Mine Ban Treaty, and would soon be joining the over 150 States Parties to that Treaty. Australia, as President of the Seventh Meeting of States Parties to the Treaty, warmly welcomed this announcement.

Next Meeting
The next CD meeting will be held Tuesday, January 30, at 10am.

- Jennifer Nordstrom, Reaching Critical Will