DYB2011-Part-II-web

Nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation
Informal working group on the 1988 Rajiv Gandhi Action Plan for a
nuclear-weapon-free and non-violent world order
The Prime Minister of India established an informal working group
composed of Indian experts and academics aimed at rejuvenating the 1988
Rajiv Gandhi Action Plan for a nuclear-weapon-free and non-violent world
order. The effort uses as its terms of reference the seven steps proposed
by India in 2006 in a working paper to the Conference on Disarmament
(CD/1816), which includes negotiation of a nuclear weapons convention as its
final step. The working group issued a report that contains recommendations
and a road map for implementing the goals of the Action Plan. Specific steps
recommended in the report included reducing the salience of nuclear weapons
in security doctrines, de-alerting, a global agreement on a no-first-use policy,
a convention prohibiting the use of nuclear weapons and the negotiation of
legally binding instruments on negative security assurances.
Civil society and other international efforts
The Asia Pacific Leadership Network for Nuclear Non-Proliferation
and Disarmament (APLN) was launched on 18 May, comprising 30 former
senior political, diplomatic and military leaders from 13 countries around the
region. 97 Gareth Evans, former Foreign Minister of Australia, convened the
first meeting. The objective of the network is to inform and energize public
opinion, and especially high-level policymakers, to take seriously the real
threats posed by nuclear weapons, and to do everything possible to achieve
a world in which they are contained, diminished and ultimately eliminated.
In its inaugural statement, 98 APLN announced that it would establish working
groups to address, inter alia, specific issues such as nuclear deterrence, nuclear
transparency and the potential for the multilateralization of “the most sensitive
stages” of the nuclear fuel cycle.
At its seventy-ninth annual meeting, held in June, the United States
Conference of Mayors adopted a resolution99 that, inter alia, reaffirmed its
call on President Obama to work with the leaders of the other nuclear-weapon
States to implement the United Nations Secretary-General’s five-point
proposal for nuclear disarmament forthwith, so that a nuclear weapons
convention or a related framework of mutually reinforcing legal instruments
could be agreed upon and implemented by the year 2020, as urged by the
97 Australia, China, India, Indonesia, Japan, Malaysia, New Zealand, Pakistan, Philippines,
Republic of Korea, Singapore, Sri Lanka and Viet Nam.
98 Members of the APLN met for the first time in Tokyo from 10 to 12 November 2011, where
those present agreed on the text of the inaugural statement released on 12 December 2011
in Seoul.
99 United States Conference of Mayors, “Adopted Resolutions: 79th Annual
Conference of Mayors—Baltimore, MD June 17-21, 2011”, p. 112. Available from
http://www.usmayors.org/resolutions/79th_conference/AdoptedResolutionsFull.pdf
(accessed 21 May 2012).
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