Radioactive Waste Disposal at Sea: Public Ideas ... - IMO

102 Chapter 6
draft article proposed by Canada listed high-level radioactive waste among
the prohibited substances.
In the subsequent debate, Canada, with strong support from all the developing
countries, attempted to include high-level radioactive waste in the
black list. The United States and Britain opposed this and argued that the
measures to protect against radioactive contamination, as they put it, were
best taken through IAEA (memo, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Denmark,
December 6, 1972, p. 3). They proposed that radioactive waste be referred
to only in general terms. In their view, an article similar to article 14 of the
Oslo Convention (which contained the only mention of radioactive waste
in that convention) should be drafted. 34
In the long debate that ensued, the developing countries were supported
by Spain and Portugal; the other Western European states chose not to comment
on this controversial matter. The Canadian compromise that was
eventually adopted put high-level radioactive waste in brackets (indicating
that the issue still was outstanding) and copied article 14 of the Oslo
Convention (implying that regulation of radioactive waste should be done
through the IAEA). In this way, the draft made a general commitment to
take measures against pollution from radioactive waste. However, radioactive
waste would not be covered by the operative part of the convention.
This diplomatic compromise did not even mention the IAEA. 35 In the end,
the Reykjavik session issued a “Text of Draft Articles of A Convention for
the Prevention of Marine Pollution” instead of a “Text of Draft Convention
for the Prevention of Marine Pollution.” Evidently, the session failed to
resolve the disagreements (memo, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Denmark,
August 11, 1972, p. 2).
In summary, the question whether to regulate ocean dumping of radioactive
waste under the convention was still unsettled. Because the U.S. delegation
thought that regulating radioactive waste and bacteriological and
chemical weapons in an inappropriate and unreasonable way introduced a
disarmament aspect into the dumping convention, this decision was one of
the most contentious issues for the coming Stockholm conference (memos,
Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Denmark, May 1, 1972, and December 6,
1972). Many reservations on the part of the developing countries, Canada,
and (to a lesser extent) Spain and Portugal also promised severe obstacles
to agreement at Stockholm. Negotiators expected developing countries to