22 December 2005
Dear Reaching Critical Will friends and advisors,
In December, governments indicated they are at least willing to discuss nuclear disarmament when they finally agreed to a programme of work in the deliberative Disarmament Commission. After a year of disarmament machinery deadlock and failures, perhaps they are beginning to feel the pressure from civil society and international leaders from Secretary-General Kofi Annan to Pope Benedict XVI, who last week called for nuclear disarmament.
As nuclear weapon states continue to refuse to disarm, they put the world in danger of increasing nuclear proliferation. The EU is struggling to maintain its credibility in acting as a nuclear non-proliferation mediator. Parliamentarians from Belgium, Britain, Norway and Germany are calling for US nukes to be removed from their soil, maintaining nuclear weapons possession damages their legitimacy in non-proliferation negotiations. France, Greece and the Ukraine have already banned foreign nuclear weapons from their territories, although France, of course, has weapons of its own.
The BBC just presented papers showing both the British and Norwegian governments were aware that the heavy water the United Kingdom sold to Norway in the 1950's was bound for Israel. Papers were also released showing Norway was aware Israel was interested in a nuclear weapons program before they resold the heavy water to Israel.
It is not, and has never been, stable or sustainable for select states to possess nuclear weapons while forbidding their possession to others. Non-proliferation efforts urgently require that nuclear weapon states begin true and global disarmament immediately, and the EU must consider viable regional solutions when negotiating with Iran over its nuclear program.
In this E-news Advisory:
1. Disarmament Commission adopts an agenda
2. General Assembly votes on First Committee resolutions
3. Iran Update
Sincerely,
Jennifer Nordstrom
Project Associate
1. Disarmament Commission adopts an agenda
The UN Disarmament Commission (DC), which has been deadlocked for several years, surprisingly agreed to an agenda on Monday, December 12, 2005. At this organizational meeting at UN headquarters, no objections were raised to current Chair Rowe’s compromise proposal on the disputed nuclear disarmament agenda item. Although the item was probably not entirely satisfactory to all parties, no one was willing to block a programme of work.
The agenda for the 2006 substantive session is:
"Recommendations for achieving the objectives of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation of nuclear weapons."
"Practical confidence-building measures in the field of conventional weapons."
The DC will also consider "Measures for improving the effectiveness of the methods of work of the UNDC", an agenda item the United States has been supporting, much as it has been advocating UN reform in all areas, including the First Committee of the General Assembly (see the US 2004 and 2003 resolutions on First Committee Reform, and UN reform debates at the World Summit in 2005).
The Disarmament Commission, a body open to all Member States under the UN General Assembly, considers and makes recommendations on disarmament problems. Unlike the Conference on Disarmament, it is not a negotiating body, but focuses on discussing two to three disarmament problems over three years, one of which is traditionally nuclear disarmament. It is also supposed to “consider the elements of a comprehensive programme for disarmament to be submitted as recommendations to the General Assembly”. In 1996, the UN DC created 16 Principles of Verification.
The 2006 substantive session will be held from April 10-28, at UN headquarters in New York City. Member States will submit their proposals for the UN DC Bureau in the first two months of 2006, after which they will hold another organizational meeting. The Asian Group is slated for Chair and the African Group for rapporteur. A bureau with strong support for disarmament and a good diplomatic track record will help Member States use the UN DC as a venue for real discussions on how to make progress in disarmament.
2. General Assembly votes on First Committee resolutions
The UN General Assembly passed all the resolutions submitted by the First Committee (Disarmament Committee) of the General Assembly on December 8, 2005, with one, “Transparency in Armaments”, to be put to a vote by the end of this week. Very few votes changed between October, when UN member states discussed, drafted and negotiated resolutions on disarmament and international security, and the plenary sessions of the General Assembly.
The General Assembly usually approves the resolutions submitted to it by the First Committee, and while more states tend to be present for the plenary votes, there are not usually many changes in position. The most significant changes this year were on the small arms omnibus resolution and the resolution on the prevention of an arms race in outer space (PAROS).
The First Committee controversially called for a vote on operative paragraph two of the traditionally consensus small arms resolution, and Mexico and Jamaica abstained to protest that the consensus-seeking paragraph did not call for a legally binding instrument on marking and tracing small arms. However, the resolution was adopted without a vote in the General Assembly.
On the annual PAROS resolution, Israel changed its sole abstention in the First Committee to a no vote, joining the only other no vote from the United States. There were no other abstentions. According to its explanation of vote in the First Committee, the United State voted against the resolution because “there is no arms race in outer space”. Ironically, many Member States and citizens are most concerned about possible US deployment of weapons in space. Russia has unilaterally declared it will not be the first nation to deploy weapons, and has invited other nations to join it in such confidence-building declarations. The US was the only vote against the new Russian resolution "Measures to promote transparency and confidence-building in outer space", in both the First Committee and the GA plenary, with Israel abstaining.
Taking into account these changes between the two, the First Committee, and consequently the General Assembly, was characterized by attempts at, and impediments to progress.
The United States voted against 22 resolutions out of 60, about 10 no votes ahead of the United Kingdom, Israel and France, who were the next most likely to break consensus.
The United States and Iran both engaged in finger-pointing on non-proliferation and disarmament via their resolutions on compliance andfollow-up to nuclear disarmament obligations, respectively (For more information, see the Verification and Compliance and Nuclear Disarmament Reports in the Final Edition of The First Committee Monitor). Both resolutions passed, although the vote on the Iranian resolution was so close that there were gasps from the floor during the tally in the First Committee.
In dealing with the dysfunctional disarmament machinery tasked with addressing these weapons systems, the First Committee delved into issues of consensus and unilateralism. The conversation on the purpose of consensus and its abuse will continue as various international disarmament fora struggle to adapt to a changed, and changing, geopolitical context. (For more information, see The First Committee Monitor’s Introduction Week 3 and Disarmament Machinery Report Weeks 1 and 2) On the last day of the First Committee, Mexico insisted the Disarmament Commission adopt an agenda by the beginning of its 2006 session, by vote if necessary. The DC adopted an agenda at its December 12, 2005 organizational meeting, and will begin substantive deliberations in 2006.
A new alliance of six countries, Brazil, Canada, Kenya, Mexico, New Zealand and Sweden, presented a creative proposal to the First Committee to establish four open-ended ad-hoc committees under the General Assembly consistent with the Five Ambassadors' (A5) proposal for a Conference on Disarmament (CD) programme of work. Although a draft resolution was not tabled, it caused a stir and demonstrated creative problem solving to address the deadlock in the CD. If there is no progress in the world's sole multilateral disarmament negotiating forum, the resolution will hopefully be tabled next year with broader support. (For more information, see The First Committee Monitor’s Disarmament Machinery Report in the Final Edition) The CD will begin its 2006 substantive session January 23, 2006. Subscribe to Reaching Critical Will’s CD Report to keep up on whether the CD will respond to this pressure and finally adopt a programme of work!
Other positive developments this year included the New Agenda Coalition’s (NAC) decision to vote for the Japanese nuclear disarmament resolution in solidarity, despite having reservations about it, and China’s first-ever for the resolution supporting the Mine Ban Treaty, though it is still not party to the Treaty. Both the New Agenda Coalition and Japan reworked their annual nuclear disarmament resolutions this year in light of the failed Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference and the 60 year anniversary of the US atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. (For more information, see the New Agenda and Renewed Determination and LandminesReports in the Final Edition of the First Committee Monitor.)
3. Iran Update
While the IAEA has not taken any action regarding Iran’s nuclear program since our last E-news Advisory, escalatory rhetoric among the parties has continued. In case you have missed the constant media coverage, the brief recap is that Iran continues its inflammatory statements about Israel, Israel declared Iranian uranium enrichment as the point of no return and therefore their deadline for diplomatic action, and Iran insisted that it would enrich uranium in Iran. The EU and the US remain very concerned, and continue to explore all diplomatic avenues. However, Iran just preemptively passed a law that would limit international access to its facilities if the IAEA refers it to the Security Council. Yesterday in Vienna, the EU3 and Iran agreed to continue discussions next month, meaning there may be enough common ground to renew negotiations.
Interestingly, the US Army War College published a paper, “Getting Ready for a Nuclear-Ready Iran” (you can download the entire publication), in which it acknowledged that neither diplomatic nor military action would prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons capabilities. This paper therefore suggested that the best way to resolve the crisis would be through Israel dismantling its nuclear program. A Nuclear Weapon Free Zone in the Middle East has been conceptually universally endorsed, but not concretely acted on. With this crisis heating up, it is time to look at regional solutions in a pragmatic and realistic way. The Middle East and the world cannot afford to risk another nuclear arms race.
Civil Society has been following this process closely, and supports non-military solutions to the crisis. The global majority understand that cascading proliferation, particularly in the volatile Middle East, is a threat to life on earth, and that the only appropriate way to deal with this threat is through global, irreversible, verifiable nuclear disarmament. The Nuclear Weapon States have a responsibility to lead this planet-saving action, starting now. Read the Civil Society and Parliamentarians letter to decision-makers, and //www.reachingcriticalwill.org/action/[email protected]