Treaties, Conferences & Committees (Oh my!)
- Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT): this treaty is the cornerstone of the nonproliferation and disarmament regime. The treaty went into force in 1970 and has three major pillars: nuclear non-proliferation, nuclear weapon disarmament, and peaceful uses of nuclear energy. This treaty also established the International Atomic Energy Agency, the IAEA, which conducts all inspections and regulates safeguarding of nuclear material. There are only three countries who did not sign to the NPT: India, Pakistan and Israel; and North Korea withdrew itself from the NPT in 2003.
Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT):This treaty has not technically entered into force. However, 148 states have signed and ratified the treaty and begun to utilize the 337 seismic verification stations to detect any nuclear explosion above a fraction of a kiloton. And none of the signatories has conducted a nuclear test since 1992. This treaty would ban all nuclear weapons testing, and allows for short notice site inspections. For this treaty to go into full effect, all the countries with nuclear power plants must sign onto the treaty. There are 44 countries in the world with nuclear power right now, including the United States, and the US has signed, but not ratified. This treaty is a crucial next step towards nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. President Obama has voiced his support for the CTBT. In order for the US to join this treaty, Obama must present the treaty to the Senate for ratification. Treaty ratification takes two thirds majority vote to pass.
Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty I (START I): negotiated between the US and the USSR, and then picked up and signed by Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, this treaty aimed for a comprehensive reduction in arms. START I was followed by START II, which was not fully realized. Recently, the United States “pressed the reset button” with Russian relations and one of the goals of the revived cooperative friendship is to negotiate a new START treaty.
Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty (FMCT): this treaty doesn’t even exist yet! The UN General Assembly voted in 1993 that, in the future, there ought to be a treaty that had a permanent cut-off on fissile material production. Since then, there’s been a debate about the details of the treaty and progress has been slow. This treaty is very important because it would halt the production of nuclear weaponry of many types, and require verification of stopped production. Stay tuned for news on FMCT progress!
Ban on Nuclear Weapons in Space: this is another treaty that hasn’t been negotiated yet, but PNA and BANG-USA completely endorse a ban on this type of weaponry. As reliant as our societies are on satellites for telecommunications, weather, national security, GPS, etc., a military strike against another country’s satellites would be devastating. Eliminating the threat altogether is a sound approach. The leading space-faring nations are the US, Russia, China and Japan. The latter three have, for some years, supported a Space Weapons Ban by treaty. Soon after his inauguration, President Obama noted his support for a ban on space weapons which threaten military and commercial satellites in space.