DYB2011-Part-II-web

United Nations Disarmament Yearbook 2011: Part II
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their undertakings in 2014 to the Preparatory Committee for the 2015 NPT Review
Conference.
The Assembly reiterated its call for the immediate commencement of
negotiations on an FMCT and its early conclusion and regretted that negotiations had
not yet started. It recognized the legitimate interest of non-nuclear-weapon States in
receiving unequivocal and legally binding security assurances from nuclear-weapon
States, which could strengthen the nuclear non-proliferation regime. It also recognized
that, by signing and ratifying relevant protocols (to treaties establishing nuclearweapon-free
zones) that contain negative security assurances, nuclear-weapon States
would undertake individual legally binding commitments with respect to the status of
such zones and not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against States parties to
such treaties.
First Committee. Speaking in explanation of its position before the vote, the
Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, which intended to vote against the draft
resolution, reacted to the text’s reference to the Democratic People’s Republic of
Korea and its nuclear weapons programme, uranium enrichment and light water
reactor construction. It stated that it was committed to a peaceful settlement through
the early and speedy opening of the Six-Party Talks and was in favour of moving
towards a settlement of the nuclear issue on the Korean peninsula on an equal basis,
in a comprehensive and full-fledged manner and through a simultaneous action-foraction
process.
Although it voted in favour of the draft resolution as a whole, the Russian
Federation explained that it abstained in the voting on paragraph 9 because it dealt
with the commencement of negotiations on an FMCT. Its position was that such
negotiations must be conducted at the CD. It believed matters related to negotiations
on that treaty should be decided within the context of the draft resolutions presented
by the representative of Canada on an FMCT and on the CD.
The following five countries that took the floor abstained in the vote:
• Brazil stated that it had the following concerns in paragraph 9 of the draft
resolution: language that would allow for negotiations on an FMCT to take place
outside the CD; exclusion of language to support the immediate commencement
of discussions within the CD of effective international arrangements to assure
non-nuclear-weapon States against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons;
and the absence of a reference to the sovereign decision of any State to conclude
an additional protocol and that additional protocols should be universally applied
once the complete elimination of nuclear weapons had been achieved. It further
disagreed to the reintroduction of some ambiguous formulations derived from
article VI of the NPT, which was supposed to be clarified by the unequivocal
undertaking of the nuclear-weapon States to accomplish complete elimination of
their nuclear arsenals, agreed on at the 2000 NPT Review Conference.
• India stressed that the draft resolution fell short of the objective to address the
need for a step-by-step process underwritten by a universal commitment and
an agreed multilateral framework for achieving global and non-discriminatory
nuclear disarmament. India voted against paragraph 2, as it could not accept
the call to accede to NPT as a non-nuclear-weapon State. Nuclear weapons
were an integral part of India’s national security and would remain so pending