Fw: BUSH PLANS TO DESTROY NUCLEAR TREATY

 

----- Original Message -----

From: Global Network

To: Global Network

Sent: Tuesday, January 04, 2005 2:48 AM

Subject: BUSH PLANS TO DESTROY NUCLEAR TREATY

U.S. seeks to defang NPT
Friday, December 31, 2004 at 17:43 JST
(Kyodo News)

WASHINGTON - The United States plans to suggest that a 2005
international conference to review the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty
should invalidate a document adopted at a 2000 meeting in which five
nuclear powers committed to an "unequivocal undertaking" to a
nuclear-free world, according to U.S. government and congressional
sources.

A U.S. government official described the final accord adopted during
the 2000 NPT review conference as a "simply historical document" and
pointed out the need to adopt a new document reflecting drastic changes
in international security conditions, including the Sept 11 terrorist
attacks in 2001.

Such an attempt could be interpreted by nonnuclear powers as reduced
commitment by the United States to nuclear disarmament and could
jeopardize the nonproliferation regime under the 1968 treaty by
possibly prompting countries such as North Korea and Iran to accelerate
their nuclear weapons development, critics say.

In the 2000 review conference, 187 signatories to the NPT adopted the
document, which includes 13 steps to nuclear disarmament to be
implemented by the five powers ? the United States, Britain, China,
Russia and France ? as well as nonnuclear powers.

"We think the international situation with regard to nonproliferation
has changed so radically that the review conference should not be
looking backward at the past final document," said the U.S. official in
reference to the conference scheduled for May in New York.

The official said the administration of President George W. Bush "no
longer supports all of the 13 steps" because some aspects of those
steps are outdated.

For example, the 2000 accord called for strengthening the 1972
antiballistic missile treaty, which barred the United States and Russia
from deploying full-scale national missile defense systems. However,
the ABM treaty was terminated in 2002 with the U.S. withdrawal.

"There is no such thing as implementing the 13 steps," the official
said, adding the administration does not see the final accord as "being
a road map or binding guideline or anything like that."

"We need to be pursuing a new document that reflects what has happened
over the last five years," the official said.

A congressional source also pointed out that an article in the NPT
which requires nuclear powers to make a serious commitment to
disarmament was created against the backdrop of a nuclear arms race
between the United States and the Soviet Union during the Cold War.

The source said that Washington does not intend to make the 13 steps a
precondition for negotiations at the 2005 review conference and that
those measures will not become a real issue at the meeting.

Thomas Graham, former special representative of the U.S. president for
arms control, nonproliferation and disarmament, said he believes the
U.S. delegation at the review conference "would be under very firm
instructions not to agree to" the point of an "unequivocal undertaking"
to total elimination of nuclear weapons.

"If the U.S. is not going to observe its commitment, then the treaty
becomes politically unbalanced," said Graham, who served under all U.S.
administrations from President Jimmy Carter to Bill Clinton.

He expressed concern about possible nuclear proliferation, saying
nonnuclear powers could start developing nuclear weapons. They could
follow in the footsteps of India and Pakistan, non-parties to the NPT
that conducted nuclear tests in 1998, Graham said.

 

Global Network Against Weapons & Nuclear Power in Space
PO Box 652
Brunswick, ME 04011
(207) 729-0517
(207) 319-2017 (Cell Phone)
http://www.space4peace.org
globalnet@mindspring.com