02 May 2000
(U.S. envoy to CD cites goal to gain universality for NPT) (3470) The success of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) has helped to "make possible the dramatic progress in nuclear disarmament since the end of the Cold War," says Ambassador Robert Grey, U.S. representative to the Committee on Disarmament (CD). In remarks to the NPT Review Conference Committee I on April 27, Grey said the treaty's core provisions remain valid, and he called for efforts to achieve universality for the NPT. As President Clinton said on March 6, Grey recalled, "The United States remains committed to achieving universal adherence to the NPT and will continue working to bring all remaining countries into the Treaty." Grey also emphasized that the United States has "made clear to India and Pakistan that their relationships with the United States cannot realize their full potential until our differences on nonproliferation are narrowed." In a wide-ranging statement on U.S. nonproliferation policy, goals, and achievements, Grey cited what he described as two "significant disappointments: the lack of Senate consent for CTBT (Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty) ratification and the lack of progress on a fissile material cutoff treaty." He noted that former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General John Shalikashvili will "help address Senators' concerns about the CTBT and build bipartisan support for eventual reconsideration of this issue by the U.S. Senate." Grey said, "We are profoundly disappointed that there are currently no negotiations on a fissile material cutoff treaty (FMCT)." The United States will work hard "for the expeditious negotiation of a cutoff treaty, which is the next logical multilateral step in the nuclear disarmament process," he added. "There is no way to get to the ultimate goal of nuclear disarmament without it." Following is the text of Grey's statement: (begin text) Ambassador Robert Grey Statement to NPT Review Conference Committee I April 27, 2000 Mr. Chairman, The allocation of items to Main Committee I includes the core provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty: Articles I, II, and VI. I would like to speak in detail to these Articles today. Articles I and II The NPT was driven by a desire to avert nuclear war and the belief that the proliferation of nuclear weapons would seriously increase that danger. Articles I and II reflect these concerns. The NPT, and its core provisions, remain valid. The NPT is nearly universal. By creating a political and legal barrier against nuclear weapons proliferation, the NPT has promoted our security and facilitated peaceful uses of the atom. The Treaty's success has also helped to make possible the dramatic progress in nuclear disarmament since the end of the Cold War. Steady progress toward universality has been made throughout the Treaty's lifetime -- from the 47 states who were party upon NPT entry into force in 1970 to today's total of 187. Since 1995, when universality was declared to be an urgent goal, additional progress has been made with the addition of nine more countries. Only Cuba, India, Israel, and Pakistan remain outside the Treaty. Despite obvious difficulties, work toward the goal of universality must continue. As President Clinton said on March 6: "The United States remains committed to achieving universal adherence to the NPT and will continue working to bring all remaining countries into the Treaty." The international community rallied strongly behind the NPT in the wake of the nuclear tests in South Asia in 1998. It has strongly endorsed the continued importance of the Treaty and affirmed that all remaining non-parties may join the NPT only as non-nuclear-weapon states. For its part, the United States will continue to work to achieve the goals of UN Security Council Resolution 1172 of June 1998. We have also made clear to India and Pakistan that their relationships with the United States can not realize their full potential until our differences on nonproliferation are narrowed. Compliance with Articles I and II is essential. For its part, the United States has laws, policies and procedures to ensure scrupulous compliance with Article I. The United States maintains constant and complete custody and control of its nuclear weapons and implements a rigorous security system to protect against theft. We have also implemented a comprehensive nuclear export control system whose purpose is to ensure that entities under U.S. jurisdiction do not provide assistance to non-nuclear-weapon states in the acquisition or manufacture of nuclear explosive devices. We are satisfied that nearly all non-nuclear weapons states parties to the NPT honor their Article II obligations. They have not sought the transfer or control of nuclear explosive devices, nor received assistance in their manufacture, nor undertaken actions that are intended to provide them with the capability to manufacture or acquire nuclear explosives. We remain concerned, however, that not all non-nuclear weapons states parties to the NPT take their Article II obligations seriously. During the last decade, NPT parties have been faced with two serious breaches of the Treaty by non-nuclear-weapon states, which have undermined regional and global security. The international community responded firmly to these breaches and the nuclear programs of Iraq and North Korea have been constrained. In both cases, questions about compliance remain. All NPT parties must continue to provide the IAEA, and the United Nations with the political, technical, and financial support necessary to enforce compliance with the NPT. Article VI Some have argued that Article VI is a "price the Nuclear Weapon States have to pay" to the non-nuclear weapons states to refrain from acquiring nuclear weapons. The United States does not look at Article VI as a price for anything. All Parties to the NPT should make Article VI work not because of altruism or a desire to be perceived as virtuous, but because like us, they believe the NPT and effective nuclear arms control measures enhance international two - one of which is not deployed. In addition, NATO has reduced the number of its nuclear weapons in Europe by more than 85 percent and the types available from eleven to one. As part of these reductions, all of NATO's ground-launched substrategic forces, including nuclear artillery and surface-to-surface missiles, have been withdrawn to the United States and many have been dismantled. The only remaining U.S. nuclear weapons in Europe, air-delivered gravity bombs, have been reduced by well over 50 percent. Deactivation/Dealerting. The United States has removed nuclear warheads from systems that will be eliminated under START I, taken all of our remaining heavy bombers off alert and detargeted all of our long-range ballistic missiles. Although the deadline for reductions under START II is December 2007, the United States and Russia have agreed to deactivate by the end of 2003 all strategic systems that will be eliminated under the Treaty once it enters into force. The strategic nuclear delivery vehicles will be placed in deactivated status by removing their nuclear warheads or taking other jointly agreed steps. U.S. NATO nuclear weapons are no longer routinely deployed on aircraft and the readiness of the aircraft that could carry them is measured in weeks and months rather than minutes. Nuclear stockpile reductions. The U.S. is not just removing warheads from the field but is taking thousands of them apart. We take this step not to fulfill a legal obligation under START I but because we believe it is in our interest to do so. It is a vivid demonstration of our commitment to Article VI. Since the end of the Cold War, we have dismantled more than 13,000 warheads -- a process which includes the actual physical separation of the warhead's conventional high explosive from its fissile material. Over 3,000 of these weapons have been dismantled since the 1995 NPT Conference. Changes in U.S. development, testing and production programs for nuclear systems. Since the fall of the Berlin Wall, the United States has terminated, truncated, or retired without replacement almost 20 nuclear systems. This self-imposed restraint applies to warhead designs, the production of fissile material for new weapons, and the launchers needed to deliver those weapons. The United States, as a matter of policy, stopped nuclear testing and producing fissile material for nuclear weapons more than seven years ago. We have not produced any new nuclear warheads during this period and have no requirements for the production of new types of warheads. All U.S. fissile material production reactors, and plutonium separation and uranium enrichment facilities have been permanently shutdown, deactivated, or scheduled for deactivation in the near future, or converted to non-weapons production use. The United States is no longer developing or producing any new land-based intercontinental ballistic missiles. In 1998, the U.S. stopped producing Trident submarines and no new types of ballistic missile submarines or submarine-launched ballistic missiles are under development. Further, the United States decided last year that it will unilaterally remove four Trident submarines from its ballistic missile submarine fleet over the next few years, regardless of the status of START II. Once accomplished, this would constitute a reduction of almost 800 deployed warheads. We have also reduced our expenditures for strategic nuclear weapons and nuclear forces personnel by nearly two-thirds since the end of the Cold War. Irreversibility. We are not just reducing and dismantling nuclear weapons, we are also taking steps to make sure that fissile material withdrawn from the military stockpile is never used in nuclear weapons. Since 1993, the U.S. has unilaterally declared approximately 226 metric tons of fissile material as excess to defense needs and has committed to make this excess fissile material available for IAEA safeguards as soon as practicable. With regard to fissile material removed from the military stockpile, there are two key elements of irreversibility -- verification against reuse of the fissile material and, ultimately, disposition to a form unusable in nuclear weapons. As a result of intensive work on the Trilateral Initiative -- launched in September 1996 -- the U.S., Russia, and the IAEA are now close to completing negotiations on a model legal agreement that would place fissile material irreversibly removed from nuclear weapon programs under IAEA verification. In addition, the United States has plans in place now to make 90 tons of excess fissile material available for IAEA safeguards. Of this total, 12 tons is under safeguards and another 13 tons of high enriched uranium was made available for safeguards during a 1995-98 downblending operation which included a successful IAEA verification experiment. In 1993 the United States signed an agreement to purchase 500 tons of high enriched uranium from Russia to be downblended to LEU over 20 years. To date, the United States has taken delivery of LEU that has been downblended from over 80 tons of HEU. In 1998, the United States and Russia agreed to cooperate on the disposition of weapon-grade plutonium withdrawn in stages from each side's nuclear military programs and designated as no longer required for defense purposes. After a year of intense negotiations, we have nearly completed an agreement that will include mutual commitments regarding the plutonium to be disposed from each side. Once the agreement is in place, the two sides will proceed in parallel with the disposition of 34 tons each. This task will take many years of sustained international involvement to implement. In 1996, the United States announced that it would eliminate its excess high enriched uranium by blending the material to low enriched uranium, thereby rendering it unusable in nuclear weapons. Thirteen tons has been downblended and another 50 tons has been targeted. After downblending, the low enriched uranium may be used as fuel for commercial nuclear power reactors. In 1997, the United States announced a disposition strategy for excess U.S. plutonium. The plutonium would either be burned up in nuclear reactors or immobilized in glass or ceramic. Assisting Others. The United States has already provided over $5 billion for many of the costs associated with nuclear disarmament and WMD non-proliferation in the former Soviet Union. Since 1995, the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program has been continued and expanded. To date, this program has provided assistance in the elimination of about 1,000 ballistic missile launchers, missiles and bombers in Russia, Kazakhstan, and Ukraine. Other programs are directed at securing some 650 tons of weapon grade fissile material and peacefully employing former weapon scientists. Early Warning. We are addressing the concern that nuclear war could result from accident or miscalculation due to false missile warning. Specifically, in 1998, the U.S. and Russian presidents agreed to an initiative to continuously exchange information on launches of ballistic missiles and space launch vehicles and to consider establishing a joint center for that purpose and a multilateral ballistic missile and space launch vehicle pre-launch notification regime. We are well on our way to establishing a bilateral center for the exchange of early warning information and working together tirelessly toward fulfillment of the other goals that our Presidents set for us to reduce nuclear dangers. Security Assurances. We have taken further steps in the area of legally binding security assurances for non-nuclear-weapon states. Since the last Review Conference the United States has signed the relevant protocols to the African Nuclear Weapon Free Zone and the South Pacific Free Nuclear Free Zone. When combined with the Latin American Nuclear Weapon Free Zone Treaty, this increases the number of Non-Nuclear Weapon States eligible for legally binding negative security assurances from all five nuclear weapon states to almost 100. Moreover, the United States continues to place great importance on its national declaration on the non-use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon states to the NPT as stated by President Clinton in 1995: The United States reaffirms that it will not use nuclear weapons against non-nuclear-weapon States Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons except in the case of an invasion or any other attack on the United States, its territories, its armed forces or other troops, its allies, or on a State toward which it has a security commitment, carried out or sustained by such a non-nuclear-weapon State in association or alliance with a nuclear-weapon State. Nuclear Posture. The U.S. has also taken steps since 1995 to make its nuclear policy reflect the changed strategic situation. In 1996, President Clinton pledged to the international community that the United States will work toward a century in which "the roles and risks of nuclear weapons can be further reduced, and ultimately eliminated." In 1997, the U.S. completed a review and issued a new Presidential Decision Directive codifying the dramatically reduced role of nuclear weapons in U.S. defense policy. In 1999, NATO issued its New Strategic Concept making clear that it has dramatically reduced its reliance on nuclear weapons. Moreover, in light of overall strategic developments and the reduced salience of nuclear weapons, NATO has undertaken a process to consider options for confidence and security building measures, verification, nonproliferation and arms control and disarmament. All of these accomplishments demonstrate a positive trend and we believe this is an impressive record. Many speakers in the plenary debate have noted these facts beginning with the Secretary-General Kofi Annan who called the accomplishments "an unmistakable record of achievement and hard-won progress." Moreover, many of these positive steps have occurred since the 1995 NPT Conference. The U.S. plans to have senior officials from both the Departments of Defense and Energy provide additional information on our accomplishments to NPT Delegations over the next two weeks. I should also note two significant disappointments: the lack of Senate consent for CTBT ratification and the lack of progress on a fissile material cutoff treaty. The United States took a leadership role in the CTBT negotiations, and is continuing its moratorium on testing. President Clinton called for the Treaty in 1993 and was the first to sign it in 1996. Since the negotiations concluded and the Treaty was opened for signature -- a truly historic achievement, none of the five nuclear weapons states has tested. As Secretary of State Albright said in her General Debate statement, we are convinced that the United States will ratify the CTBT. As she noted, former Chairman of the joint Chiefs of Staff General John Shalikashvili has been enlisted to help address Senators' concerns and build bipartisan support for eventual reconsideration of this issue by the U.S. Senate. We are profoundly disappointed that there are currently no negotiations on a fissile material cutoff treaty (FMCT). At the 1995 NPT Conference, parties supported the "immediate commencement and early conclusion" of these negotiations. Finally, in 1998 the Conference on Disarmament reached a consensus to establish an Ad Hoc Committee to negotiate an FMCT. Yet, the Committee was not re-established in 1999 nor has it been to date this year. The United States will continue to push hard for the expeditious negotiation of a cutoff treaty, which is the next logical multilateral step in the nuclear disarmament process. There is no way to get to the ultimate goal of nuclear disarmament without it. On the question of missile defenses, I would like to reiterate Secretary of State Albright's observations that the U.S. is not bent on sabotaging the ABM Treaty. As she noted, the world has changed dramatically since the NPT entered into force, and since the ABM Treaty was signed. The Treaty has been amended before, and there is no good reason it cannot be amended again to reflect new realities. THE WAY AHEAD Perhaps the most important challenge to this conference is to chart the way forward. We welcome discussions on this critical issue and look forward to participating constructively in negotiations seeking to elaborate the way ahead. All must acknowledge that much remains to be completed -- negotiation and conclusion of the FMCT, for example, is long overdue. CTBT has been negotiated but achieving its entry into force must be our next goal. Bringing START II into force remains a priority and conclusion of a START III Treaty as soon as possible is something all support. There have been a number of suggestions for what could be included beyond this renewed agenda. Many of the concepts contained in these suggestions the United States could support. For example, on the thirtieth anniversary of the entry into force of the NPT, President Clinton said, without equivocation, that the United States is committed to the ultimate elimination of all nuclear weapons. We, too, are anxious for the negotiation of the Trilateral Initiative to be completed and for even larger quantities of excess fissile materials to be placed under IAEA supervision -- a highly practical implementation of the principle of irreversibility in arms control. A healthy dose of realism is required as we look ahead. Attaching unrealistic expectations to our future agenda risks undermining the very regime that we seek to strengthen. For example, we cannot support "timebound frameworks for nuclear disarmament"; the tested and effective approach of practical, incremental steps will not be abandoned. Arms control does not occur in a vacuum. External events will affect the pace and timing no matter how much importance we all attach to expediting the negotiating process. Proposals calling for the negotiation of a global negative security assurance are not well founded -- protocols to nuclear weapon free zones already provide the possibility for legally binding negative security assurances to over one hundred countries. Demating of all nuclear weapons could lead to crisis instability and, therefore, cannot be supported. The United States comes before this Conference ready to roll up its sleeves and get down to work to see what we can accomplish collectively. Our attitude is that we are engaged in a joint endeavor. We all have a common goal -- our differences revolve around how to achieve it. We will listen respectfully to all proposals and we will dearly articulate our own perspective. Within our limits, we shall be flexible. In short, we will seek to follow the advice rendered by one of the more colorful U.S. Presidents. In a letter written to his son in 1915 President Teddy Roosevelt said: All my life in politics, I have striven to make the necessary working compromise between the ideal and the practical. If a man does not have an ideal and try to live up to it, then he becomes a mean, base and sordid creature, no matter how successful. If, on the other hand, he does not work practically, with the knowledge that he is in the world of actual men and must get results, he becomes a worthless head-in-the-air creature, a nuisance to himself and everybody else. Teddy Roosevelt would take comfort from the fact that included in the name of the subsidiary body established within Main Committee I, which has many idealists, are the words, "practical steps." Our goal then is to identify the most practical steps to achieve our shared ideal. (end text) (Distributed by the Office of International Information Programs, U.S. Department of State. Web site: http://usinfo.state.gov)