Angelika Beer
MdEP

Konferenz "A comprehensive approach towards nuclear disarmament"

Brüssel, am 19.04.2007

The role of EU in the implementation of the NPT: Lessons learned from the past disarmament treaties


Dear Ladies and Gentlemen, dear colleagues,

This is the right moment to hold a conference on nuclear disarmament. Why? It's not because EU members recently decided to invest dozens of billions of Euros in the modernisation of their nuclear weapons, or because NPT PrepCom is approaching.

It is because during this week the Nuclear Suppliers Group is meeting in Cape Town in order to discuss, and maybe vote on, the US-India Deal on nuclear cooperation. A positive and consensual vote on the US-India deal will have far reaching consequences especially for the fight against nuclear weapons and proliferation. Probably, this will be the final and therefore lethal assault on the NPT – if we regard this in a historical perspective.

With respect to the issue of our panel, I would like to introduce the following thesis on the EU's role concerning the implementation of NPT: The EU is non-existing in this field, even if the EU has a so called Common Foreign and Security Policy, a High Representative for Security Policy, a Special Representative for Weapons of Mass Destruction, and so on.

The reason why I'm telling this is fourfold:

FIRST: As mentioned before, the relevant EU bodies haven't reacted to the decisions of UK and France to invest huge sums of money in the modernisation of their nuclear weapons. From a pure legal perspective of the NPT, which says that its member states must disarm their arsenals, these decisions are simply illegal. From a political point of view, it's even worse because it gives the wrong signal to all those states which are trying to develop a nuclear program and thinking of the idea to also generate nuclear weapons. Such modernisation programmes just tell them that those weapon systems will be needed in the future and that if you haven't got one, you will always be a second class member of the international community.

SECOND: The EU hasn't said anything about the US policies in the field of nuclear weapons. The EU has no position on the fact that over 480 tactical US weapons are on European soil and can – in a situation of war – be used by Germany, the Netherlands, or Italy according to the NATO rules of Nuclear Sharing. This constitutes a de facto breach of NPT because those countries which signed the treaty haven't declared that they are – in a war situation – nuclear weapon states. Additionally, the EU hasn't said anything on the US plans to develop a new generation of Mini-Nukes that are likely to be used in future pre-emptive strikes against enemy nuclear facilities, and that will even undermine the logic of nuclear deterrence, which guaranteed at least a certain degree of predictability and stability.

THIRD: The Parliament urged the Council in its resolution on 17 March 2007 to adopt a Common Position on the NPT PrepCom with the aim of rescuing the treaty. I also have sent a Written Question on this matter to both the Council and Commission. So far, nothing has happened. This NPT PrepCom and the NPT conference in 2010 need to be well prepared – the EU's leading security policy actors need to make up their minds, to develop progressive ideas and to lobby for their implementation.

My final point concerns the US-India deal. This accord is in absolute contradiction to the NPT because it awards a country that clandestinely developed and tested a military program, triggering an international embargo; a country that won't sign the NPT after getting the OK from the NSG; a country that will open only some civilian facilities to IAEA inspectors... And on all this the EU has no Common Position. What is more, it plans to conclude an agreement with India that includes also, similar to all third country agreements, a WMD clause which is not worth the paper it is written on, which will never be implemented.

Summing up, the EU Common Security Policy does not exist in the field of nuclear disarmament. For me, EU security policy is not only about sending troops and police men somewhere in crisis management actions. But it should mean also to reduce threats by disarming WMD potentials – even EU ones; for the sake of the survival of 450 million EU-citizens.

Let me finally say something more positive. Let me draft something which could be the EU Position.

"1. Our ultimate long term objective is a worldwide phasing out of nuclear energy because of its severe risks for the survival of mankind and its extremely high costs because of accidents and the use of nuclear weapons. Nuclear energy is always a dual use technology which can be used both in a civilian and in a military way.

2. We acknowledge that we cannot prevent states from developing nuclear programs on a national level and we fear that in the coming years another 20-30 countries will try to develop a nuclear capacity which might also be used for developing nuclear weapons.

3. We therefore think that for the short and medium term we need a multilateral instrument which prevents states especially from developing national enrichment capabilities and therefore reducing considerably the risk of proliferation.

4. We stay committed to the Non-Proliferation-Treaty (NPT) and IAEA because realistically there is no alternative international legal instrument with the function of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation. But we strongly demand for a reform of both NPT and IAEA because of their highly contradictory tasks. This reform must comprise the following aspects:

4.1. The deletion of the promotion of nuclear energy as one of the three tasks of NPT and IAEA besides non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament

4.2. The de facto implementation of the nuclear disarmament clause

4.3. The increase of the IAEA's budget for inspections and other verification and control measures regarding non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament"

Abolition 2000 Europe

 

 

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