Reviving Global Nuclear Governance
By Joel Sandhu
The nuclear non-proliferation regime is staggering under immense pressure. Iran remains unwilling to bend under international pressure, an erratic and unpredictable North Korea threatens stability in East Asia and terrorists are eager to acquire nuclear weapons. The month-long talks in New York this May to review the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) yielded little more than the disappointing conference in 2005 – an agreement to reconvene in 2012 on how to proceed on a nuclear free zone in the Middle East. To rescue the NPT regime member states need to urgently move beyond the stalemate between the nuclear ‘haves’ and the ‘have-nots’. The non-proliferation diplomacy requires new leadership to pull the regime back from the nuclear precipice.
If the five year Review Conference of the NPT is a pulse taking exercise for the nuclear non-proliferation regime, this year’s conference narrowly escaped the tragedy which befell the 2005 conference. The rapid flurry of diplomatic efforts over Iran lead observers inside the NPT negotiations to believe the US and other weapons states sought a quick diplomatic victory over Iran at the expense of long term goals of the arms control regime. Non-nuclear weapon states within the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) accuse the nuclear haves of hypocrisy on disarmament promises and criticise what they perceive as Western efforts to impose ever harsher non-proliferation measures on them. NPT negotiations over the last decade have been poisoned with such diverging interest and agendas between the nuclear haves and have-nots with little possibility for progress.
This is counterproductive and fatal for global nuclear governance. It fails to reflect the realities of the 21st century, namely the rapid transition in global geopolitics and the need to integrate rising powers including Brazil, China, Turkey and South Africa into effective multilateralism to address challenges from non-proliferation to climate change and economic governance.
The last decade proved that consensus building on the three pillars of the NPT (non-proliferation, disarmament and peaceful use of nuclear technology) is a difficult task. Non-weapons states of the NAM decry the lack of progress on nuclear disarmament and deplore the modernization of nuclear arsenals by the recognized nuclear weapon states under the NPT: the United States, Russia, China, France and the United Kingdom. Several non-weapons states have already embarked on new nuclear energy programs, while others contemplate the possibility or floating ideas, such as uranium enrichment despite concerns of safety, security and waste management. Diverging priorities and conflicting agendas make it a mighty challenge to pull the NPT regime back from the brink of failure.
Yet challenges also provide opportunities. Dealing with today’s nuclear non-proliferation agenda requires cooperation between established and rising powers. If the US wants to get non-weapons states to agree to more intrusive IAEA inspections and more controls on the export of nuclear technology it will need to revisit its negotiation tactics which sideline the non-aligned. Washington will need to provide resources to the IAEA for improved detection and deterrence of illicit nuclear activities. US Congress needs to commit to ratifying the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and to a clear non-first use policy of nuclear weapons. At the same time, Europe needs to overcome French opposition in order to commit to nuclear disarmament goals.
One sided leadership will not suffice to rescue the threadbare NPT. Rising powers such as China, Brazil, Turkey and South Africa and will need to step up on their end. This is all the more urgent since the ravenous energy demands of these and other emerging economic powers will increase the potential of nuclear energy in these countries and they will have to answer to the critical safety and security questions.
China’s prioritization of Iranian energy supply over preventing a potential conflict in the Persian Gulf has undermined the capacity of the international community to go beyond watered down sanctions on enforcing international non-proliferation rules. Brazil will have to do more than cosying up to President Ahmadinejad and its implicit support for Iran’s nuclear activities. Brasilia needs to commit to signing the Additional Protocols and making them a requirement for international cooperation on enrichment and reprocessing. South Africa and Turkey need to flex their muscles and bridge the ideological gap between the haves and the have-nots. If skilfully used, rising powers are uniquely positioned to promote middle-ground between the NAM and the West and to breathe new life into the NPT, the “cornerstone of the global nuclear non-proliferation regime.”
Rising powers will have to take concrete steps and show initiative on moving forward. This includes support for new approaches to countering the proliferation risk inherent in the peaceful use of nuclear energy – an urgent priority given the rising demand of nuclear energy and problems facing traditional and alternative energy sources. Proposals on multilateralizing the nuclear fuel cycle have been met with great suspicion from NAM countries as a Western ploy to cement their nuclear technology advantage. A truly global response to non-proliferation and the right to peaceful use of civil nuclear technology will require not just national obligations and actions but enhanced global governance with space for rising powers to have a larger stake in nuclear diplomacy.
The future of global nuclear governance will see the rise of non-traditional actors actively participating and shaping international treaties, agreements, organizations, regulatory regimes, monitoring and verification mechanisms and supplementary arrangements at the regional and bilateral levels. The future of global governance requires joint leadership from established and rising powers if the NPT is to continue serving after 40 years of ensuring a world free from nuclear war.
Joel Sandhu is Research Associate of the Global Public Policy Institute (GPPi) in Berlin, which initiated and co-organizes the GG2020 program.
