Nuclear Weapons Convention
More than 140 nations have expressed support for the immediate commencement of negotiations on a Nuclear Weapons Convention — a comprehensive treaty to outlaw and eliminate nuclear weapons — and UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon has made it the centrepiece of his disarmament action plan. An overwhelming majority of the world's people, including in the nuclear-armed nations, support such a convention. However, the Australian Government has refused to join the call, stating that it is premature to begin work on an abolition treaty.
A Nuclear Weapons Convention is the most obvious and realistic path to a nuclear-weapon-free world. It would ban nuclear weapons and the core materials used to create them, and heavy penalties would apply to prevent and deter governments and terrorists from acquiring nuclear devices or violating the fundamental ban on their use. All nuclear-armed nations would be required to dismantle their nuclear arsenals in accordance with agreed steps, and an international monitoring system would be set up to verify compliance.
The Nuclear Weapons Convention would build on the 1968 nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which despite successive attempts at improvements continues to lack the effective mechanisms needed to achieve and maintain a world without nuclear weapons. Forty years after its entry into force, there is still no comprehensive process under way for nuclear abolition. The current step-by-step approach has proven unsatisfactory. With growing proliferation threats and the continued refusal of the nuclear powers to disarm, it is time to seek a new path.
Why a Nuclear Weapons Convention
- There is an urgent political necessity and a window of opportunity to pursue the total abolition of nuclear weapons now.
- A convention will reduce nuclear dangers by making it unlawful for anyone to use, deploy, produce or proliferate nuclear weapons.
- Nuclear abolition has the support of two-thirds of all governments and overwhelming endorsement from public opinion everywhere.
- Work on a convention will strengthen the current non-proliferation regime while establishing the conditions for disarmament.
- A convention will engage states that are outside the NPT and will provide effective and non-discriminatory obligations for everyone.
- Work on a convention will facilitate further incremental steps and bring advocates of non-proliferation and disarmament closer together.
- A convention will provide legal recognition that any use of nuclear weapons would be a war crime and crime against humanity.
- A convention will develop appropriate phases to enable all the nuclear weapon possessors to eliminate their existing arsenals quickly and securely.
- A convention will help build trust and confidence among nations by establishing much more effective systems to verify compliance.
- Governments negotiated conventions to outlaw other inhumane weapons — now it’s time to prohibit nuclear weapons, the most inhumane of all.
Australian Government's position
Australia has acknowledged that a Nuclear Weapons Convention may be necessary in the longer term for the achievement of a nuclear-weapon-free world. However, it has not been willing to advocate for the negotiation of such a treaty. Foreign Minister Stephen Smith has stated that, for the time being, Australia will focus its diplomatic efforts on what it considers to be more immediate goals towards achieving a world free of nuclear weapons, namely, the entry into force of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the negotiation of a Fissile Materials Treaty.
In September 2009 the Joint Standing Committee on Treaties, a cross-party parliamentary committee with members from both houses of parliament, recommended unanimously that Australia make clear in international fora its support for a Nuclear Weapons Convention. All major national political parties supported its report. The Australian Government, in its official response to the committee’s inquiry, stated that the international community may need to explore possible legal frameworks for the eventual abolition of nuclear weapons, but it does not see this as something to be pursued in the short term.
In 2008 the Australian and Japanese governments established the International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, which aimed to reinvigorate global debate on nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament in the context of the Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference of 2010 and beyond. It argued in its main report that an important project for the medium term would be to develop, refine and build international understanding and acceptance of the need for a Nuclear Weapons Convention, and that there is no reason why detailed further work on such a treaty should not commence now, with government support.
Before the Labor Party came to power at the federal election in November 2007, the party’s foreign affairs spokesperson argued in a policy speech that the proposal to establish a Nuclear Weapons Convention is timely and important, and noted that a convention could be used as a tool to assist short-term disarmament goals. Three months later, in response to questioning by a journalist, he pledged that a Labor government, if elected, would drive the international agenda for a nuclear weapons convention. However, this promise has not been honoured.
For detailed information on the positions of all governments, click here.
