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Treaties &
Alliances
The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty: Is it as good as it sounds? by Sophia Barkat I'll try to write an article on Disarmament Treaties from time to time. This month it's on the Comprehensive Nuclear Test-Ban Treaty. It's part of the UN's effort to increase disarmament. The Treaty was opened for signature at New York: 24 September 1996, is not yet in force, and the depositary: Secretary-General of the United Nations. I will introduce to you the List of nations that "ratified" the Treaty, "signed" it and those that did not. Apparently, "signing" isn't the same as "ratifying". In general English, "ratifying" means "to approve and sanction formally" (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary.) I wonder what "ratify" means in the context of the UN, though. Does it mean to pass laws in your home country to enforce the International Treaty even further? If so, is not an international treaty fundamental enough to be upheld in a country's courts? In any case, here's is the member country list: Ratified by: Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, Chile, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Poland, Romania, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, Signed but not ratified by: China, Colombia, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran (Islamic Republic of), Israel, United States of America, Viet Nam Not signed by: Democratic People's Republic of Korea, India, Pakistan. Some thoughts It seems that some countries with no nuclear weapons but only atomic energy plans -- energy production or research -- have signed the treaty and ratified it into domestic law. And countries that have signed the treaty but not ratified it have nuclear weapons and reserve the choice to use them, and when they do they will site that they have no domestic law to prohibit the use, and hence can denounce the UN Treaty at any time they want. This may express the caution a nation takes because it does not feel that other such nations will abide by the Treaty either. The last group, esp. India and Pakistan, seem to be on an weapons race and continue to test nuclear weapons. Along with N. Korea, these two nations seem to be at a stage in their nuclear policy that does not permit signing the treaty. Questions arise whether signing a treaty has any merit if it does not enforce members to make domestic laws. The fact that many nations -- newly independent nations from the ex-Soviet Union for e.g. and many African, Asian, Latin American nations have not signed the treaty might raise questions about the usefulness of the Treaty. The actual Treaty can be found here: http://disarmament2.un.org/TreatyStatus.nsf/ The Monitoring System As worded in the Treaty: 16. The International Monitoring System shall comprise facilities for seismological monitoring, radionuclide monitoring including certified laboratories, hydroacoustic monitoring, infrasound monitoring, and respective means of communication, and shall be supported by the International Data Centre of the Technical Secretariat. 17. The International Monitoring System shall be placed under the authority of the Technical Secretariat. All monitoring facilities of the International Monitoring System shall be owned and operated by the States hosting or otherwise taking responsibility for them in accordance with the Protocol. 18. Each State Party shall have the right to participate in the international exchange of data and to have access to all data made available to the International Data Centre. Each State Party shall cooperate with the International Data Centre through its National Authority. Some reasons why countries may not want to sign it, while other may: There is no "Honor Code" that allows you to go about your business, your word being the final word. Turns out the CNTB comes with a bureaucratic self-monitoring system but a lax reporting system when it comes to ground data like seismological data, while it's overhead surveillance system opens up the possibility of being spied upon by regulating countries. According to the Treaty there will be "established as organs of the CNBT Organization: the Conference of the States Parties, the Executive Council and the Technical Secretariat, which shall include the International Data Centre (IDC)". It's not clear how the observed data from each nation signing the treaty will reach the IDC -- by self-reporting system (honor code) or by direct participation of Organization, or both. If actual procedures are more clear, they are not stated in the Treaty. The Treaty does say though, that, data gathering will be done "in the least intrusive manner possible consistent with the timely and efficient accomplishment of their objectives. It shall request only the information and data necessary to fulfil its responsibilities under this Treaty. It shall take every precaution to protect the confidentiality of information on civil and military activities and facilities coming to its knowledge in the implementation of this Treaty and, in particular, shall abide by the confidentiality provisions set forth in this Treaty." Since many nations signed the Treaty but don't have the capability to track down or differentiate between non-intrusive fact gathering missions of the Organization from plain old spy missions, the Organization's wording simply stands as a way of taking away any legal liability of the UN and the Organization arising from spying done by participant nations on each other under the disguise of UN work. The very fact that nations with no capability to protect their own privacy sign such treaties might make them prey to all kinds of spying, not that this would have reduced the level had the countries not signed such a treaty. But it allows for the spy to be invited into the national airspace, etc. Pre-existing Pacts and the Treaty Some nations like Germany, France, Sweden, UK fall under an umbrella of information sharing pacts like the NATO and EU, and may already know what they need to about their neighbors, and hence have no problem signing such treaties. Pre-existing geopolitical pacts may also make membership easier as one feels safe from one's immediate neighbors. Treaties and Hop-scotch Geopolitics Some countries like Bangladesh may not have any military secrets from its neighbors, though in it's case, it's neighbors, except for China, have not signed the CNBT Treaty. This makes it possible for CNBT nations to use Bangladesh as a spying satellite on India and Burma, while they can use China to spy on North Korea and China itself. Similarly, the US can spy on Mexico, Brazil, Chile, Peru and also Canada, or use these member nations to spy on non-member neighbors. Conversely, Mexico may be at a huge disadvantage to return the favor to the US. At most it can be a learning ground for countries like Bangladesh, which by virtue of the membership, have access to library knowledge of IDC collected data. Unprotected Treaties & the rise of Bilateral Alliances If you notice, the CNBT Treaty not only leaves less militarized nations open to member nation spying, but it also carves up the Earth into member nations and non-member nations. It gives countries like North Korea, India and Pakistan, which all happen to have nuclear weapons and are neighbors of China to strike some regional treaties with China, to ensure that it's neighboring nations like China are not used as spying grounds by the more technologically superior member nations. Bilateral treaties with the US, Russia, similarly may arise, in which countries share information with super powers to appease them that no nuclear weapon will be used against them. When this does not happen, super powers may exert pressure and corner non-member nations into bilateral and more unfavorable treaties or hard sanctions. This is the story between North Korea and the US essentially. Such secret and public alliances are most likely to develop, and often show up in weapons sales deals that are made public or exposed by spy operations. Thus a regional arms race between India and Pakistan may end up in both nations making their nuclear programs known to the super powers, and by leakage to other nations who share what they know with each other. The whole scenario implies that information may be easier to get on such nations than thought, though they still might be proceeding with an unacceptable nuclear weapons race. Deductions: It would seem that such treaties do not create global alliances but create regional tension and bilateral alliances between non-member nations and super power nations in complaince. As such they do not slow down nuclear or for that matter any arms race by nations who wish to have a nuclear weapons program and wish to test such weapons. It does not have any plan to force nations to ratify the Treaty into law within their own nations. It makes technologically advanced nations capable of spying on poorer nations able to do so with the excuse of monitoring for nuclear weapons, and it turns nations into potential spying grounds. And yet, the Treaty serves to create some level of openness amongst member countries on where they are on the nuclear program, until the nation changes it's membership. Some recommended changes: Measures to ensure that UN invigilators are not unethical and motivated by personal gain or national interest to spy on member nations must be made. At present the fact that selection process of such invigilators maybe more flexible -- upto the Nation offering invigilators or just not overseen carefully -- leaves the Treaty weaker than it aims to be. The fact that UNSCOM members like David Kay were part of the US team overseeing the nuclear program of Iraq and lied about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq, while Scott Ritter, a team-mate reported truthfully that Iraq possessed no WMDs and that David Kay had monetary interests to lie implies that gross mistakes can occur within organizations such as the UN. |
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