How to defuse the devices of the nuclear-armed states

It's their future: a choir performs at Oslo City Hall during the conference on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons organised by the Norwegian government in 2013. Demotix / Alexander Widding. All rights reserved.

After
four weeks of statements, deliberations and often bruising negotiations at the
UN headquarters, the states party to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT)
could not agree a plan for nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation to guide
their work over the next five years.

The draft
outcome was blocked on 22 May by the United States, with cover from Canada and the
UK. The US blamed an “unrealistic and
unworkable” demand from Egypt to set a deadline for the convening of a conference
on a zone in the Middle East free of weapons of mass destruction—a conference
the last NPT review in 2010 had stipulated must take place by 2012.

By the
end of the conference, what would have been the disarmament section
of the outcome document was unacceptably weak. Its adoption would have dealt another blow to the
credibility of the NPT as a vehicle for nuclear-disarmament efforts. The draft
contained no meaningful commitments by the nuclear-armed states and their
allies. It set out few clear activities and no deadlines.

Indeed, in
many areas it rolled back on disarmament promises made in 2010—such as diminishing
the role of nuclear weapons in security doctrines, excised from the draft. It also
suggested that work on nuclear disarmament at the UN General Assembly be done
by consensus, even though that forum has always operated through democratic
voting procedures.

Overall, the
draft strongly reflected the priorities of the NPT’s five officially nuclear-armed
states and their nuclear allies, in favour of upholding a status quo which
features little activity on disarmament on
the one hand and the modernisation of
nuclear arsenals on the other. The conference
president had said the NPT belonged equally to all its members but, amid a lack
of consultation, backroom deals rather than negotiation and bullying behind
closed doors at late-night sessions, it was no surprise the result did not
reflect the concerns of most states. Indeed, some asserted that the draft, in
particular the disarmament section, did not represent a negotiated document at
all.

Skewed debate

A wider analysis of multilateral fora
discussing nuclear disarmament shows that lower-income countries are less
likely than richer ones to send representatives and, if they do, field smaller
delegations who are less likely to speak. Many are in nuclear-weapons-free
zones, whereas significant high-income countries are part of a nuclear
alliance, which shows how the debate is skewed.

Some
states expressed their frustration and sense of injustice at these dynamics in New York: South
Africa compared the “sense that the
NPT has degenerated into minority rule” to the conditions of apartheid. If it
has not already become the case, the NPT is in danger of being perceived as a
vehicle for the interests of nuclear-armed states, who are not seen to be
upholding their end of the treaty’s disarmament/non-proliferation bargain (they
negotiate in good faith for disarmament; others do not join the nuclear club)—another
instance of the failing global stewardship of the five permanent members of the
Security Council.

Though the
draft disarmament plan would have lacked impact and credibility if adopted, recent analysis has suggested that
the reduction of stockpiles of nuclear weapons by NPT nuclear-armed states is
entirely unaffected by whether an NPT review has any outcome. Against this
background, it is clear something new is urgently needed.

Humanitarian focus

In fact, a
new initiative is under way. At the 2010 NPT conference, parties expressed
concern at the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear
weapons. Since then, momentum has been building around a humanitarian-focused
reframing of the issue. This concentrates on the weapons themselves and their unacceptable impact on human beings and the
environment, rather than on claims about their strategic and security functions.

Unlike the other weapons of mass destruction, there is no comprehensive, explicit prohibition on the possession, production, transfer and use of nuclear weapons.

At conferences hosted by Norway,
Mexico and Austria, and within the academic and NGO communities, new evidence
has been presented, with survivors of nuclear explosions providing powerful and
crucial testimony. Increased concern from the great majority of states
worldwide has been seen in forums including the NPT, where this year 159 states signed a joint
statement on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons.

This led
to the one substantive outcome of four weeks of discussion in New York. At the
conclusion of the NPT review conference, 107 countries had endorsed the Humanitarian Pledge, which commits them
to take action to “fill the legal gap for the prohibition
and elimination of nuclear weapons”. It features a commitment to join other
states, international organisations, the International Committee of the Red
Cross and civil society in efforts to “stigmatise, prohibit and eliminate”
nuclear weapons, based on their unacceptable humanitarian consequences. Though it
refers to the need for new legal measures to support NPT obligations to develop
effective measures on disarmament, its implications go beyond the treaty.

Treaty ban

Unlike
the other weapons of mass destruction, there is no
comprehensive, explicit prohibition on the possession, production, transfer
and use of nuclear weapons. This is the most immediate ‘legal gap’ which needs
filling, through a treaty banning
nuclear weapons. This would be a logical next step from the humanitarian initiative and
would represent an effective measure towards nuclear disarmament.

Even if
the nuclear-armed states did not initially join, it would represent a clear
normative assertion that nuclear weapons are inherently unacceptable and would
have practical impacts, such as on the financing of nuclear-weapons
modernisation. Unlike the NPT, where different roles are assigned to the nuclear-armed
states and those without such weapons, it would not discriminate between states
in their obligations.

To many
states the humanitarian initiative has represented the coming of democracy to
nuclear disarmament and a recognition of the priorities of the vast majority,
which do not have nuclear weapons—Costa Rica expressed this
strongly at the NPT review. It also threatens the hold of the nuclear-armed
states over the agenda, suggesting that the object of urgent concern should be
nuclear weapons’ human impact rather than the nuclear-armed states’ security
theories.

The
nuclear-armed NPT states thus engaged in desperate efforts to remove any
reference to humanitarian consequences from the draft outcome. France even
attempted to deny that any new
evidence on the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons had emerged or that
there was any risk posed by their own nuclear weapons.

The 107 backers
of the pledge must now take the momentum of the humanitarian initiative
forward. The negotiation of any new legal instrument should be open to all
states but unamenable to being blocked by any one. Consensus rules in
multilateral forums do not necessarily ensure open inclusion: they can instead
perpetuate the dominance of a small number of states on matters of pressing
global concern.

This
August marks the 70th anniversary of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and
Nagasaki. It is time for negotiations on a treaty banning such weapons to begin
in earnest.