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The Preparatory Committee for the 2026 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) is holding its second session from 22 July to 2 August 2024 at the Palais des Nations in Geneva, Switzerland. In this regard, we would like to share the speeches of Mr. Mikhail Kondratenkov, Deputy Head of the Delegation of the Russian Federation at the Second Session of the Preparatory Committee for the 11th Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Deputy Director of the Department for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation.
25 July, 2024. Cluster I: Nuclear disarmament
Mr. Chairman,
Last year in our statements, we paid much attention to the close interrelation between the politico-military and strategic realities, on the one hand, and the situation on the track of nuclear disarmament, on the other hand. We specifically emphasized that this interrelation had been not duly taken into account at the NPT forum despite the fact that the state of regional and global security environment was unanimously acknowledged to be dire.
A year later, we have to recognize that general situation has not improved, and, in fact, remains prone to further deterioration. While the international security and strategic stability situation continues to degrade, many delegations persist in their unwillingness to adequately measure their disarmament initiatives against today’s realities of the world.
Russia, for its part, has consistently maintained that it is necessary to rely on the approaches that have no alternative and that have been enshrined in the provisions of the NPT and the consensus documents of the NPT review process. Their key clauses stipulate that nuclear disarmament should be considered as an integral part of the process of general and complete disarmament and that steps leading to nuclear disarmament should promote international peace and stability and be based on the principle of increased and undiminished security for all.
In the current extremely adverse international security environment, we believe it to be twice as obvious that any concepts involving “shortcuts” to a nuclear-weapon-free world, including immediately outlawing nuclear weapons as a means of ensuring security, are unworkable. We continue to consider such initiatives, including the TPNW, counter-productive, as they cannot bring us any closer to reaching nuclear zero, but rather deepen the divide between the parties to the NPT, shaking the foundations of its regime.
Any ideas involving “compartmentalized” development of some “universal” measures of nuclear arsenals transparency and nuclear disarmament verification, appear to be equally inadequate. What we have here at hand is highly sensitive national security aspects that should not be addressed without due regard for strategic situation and outside any substantive negotiations on specific future arms control and disarmament agreements.
Any further practical results in the reduction of nuclear weapons and ultimately their complete, transparent and verifiable elimination can only be achieved on the basis of a consensus, realistic sequence of actions and carefully calibrated step-by-step approach. Furthermore, this collaboration will need to involve all the States possessing military nuclear capabilities.
This is an objective reality that in the current situation, Russia has to retain nuclear deterrence as an integral component of its efforts to address specific external threats, which continue to increase, affecting our country’s vital interests. As a consequence, while the provisions of Russia’s doctrines evolve, the factor of nuclear deterrence keeps playing an important role. Nevertheless, we strictly outline the extreme circumstances of self-defense in which Russia reserves the right to nuclear response.
We remain consistently committed to the principle that a nuclear war cannot be won, and must never be fought, which the N5 States reaffirmed in January 2022 in their joint statement. It is essential that the actions of the three Western States are consistent with this statement in all its entirety, including with the obligation to avoid military confrontations among the nuclear powers and to acknowledge each other’s security interests. However, that is what the Western States have failed to do.
What is more, in pursuit of overwhelming military superiority and with full support of its allies, the United States continues to undermine the remains of the international security architecture, which it has already destroyed to a large extent. Washington has opted for bloc politics and keeps forming more and more military coalitions, implementing a variety of actions and technical military programs that undermine strategic stability. These negative factors have been listed in detail in the earlier joint statement by the Republic of Belarus and the Russian Federation as States Parties to the Treaty on the Establishment of the Union State.
Particular emphasis should be put on the destabilizing practice of the NATO’s so-called “nuclear sharing” involving forward-based U.S. nuclear weapons deployed in Europe, that is, thousands miles away from the U.S., and capable of promptly hitting critical targets in the territory of Russia and its allies. Given the general increase in threats posed by the West and active modernization of the mentioned nuclear capabilities, this practice increases strategic risks and prompts one to take compensating counter-measures. This factor has considerably complicated the dialogue at the NPT forum for decades, and has long been a major obstacle to further steps in the field of nuclear disarmament. We reiterate that the United States’ nuclear weapons must be completely withdrawn to their national territory and the relevant infrastructure in Europe must be dismantled.
Washington’s steps to replicate such schemes in other parts of the world where the United States already practices its so-called “extended nuclear deterrence,” also have extremely negative implications for regional and global security. In particular, the United States’ and Republic of Korea’s joint “nuclear planning” activities accompanied by calls to involve Japan in the process, create considerable tension in the Asia-Pacific and spur arms race. These tensions are fueled by Washington’s active steps to deploy its strategic platforms in the region, including nuclear delivery vehicles, and plans to transfer systems that could carry nuclear weapons, to their allies. In particular, the United States intends to transfer to Australia submarines designed, among other things, to carry nuclear cruise missiles that are under development. This poses a number of serious questions in the context of both the NPT and the Treaty of Rarotonga.
One should also mention Washington’s long-term policy of shaking and re-formatting the arms control architecture to suit its selfish purposes. The system of relevant mutually reinforcing agreements has already been largely destroyed by the United States, who, on the one hand, has cynically dismantled all the international instruments that restrained it, and, on the other hand, took destructive steps that rendered the implementation of a number of treaties counter-productive for other parties. All this highlights the hypocrisy of the United States’ attempts to impose on its opponents unfair arms control and strategic risk reduction schemes that do not correspond to the realities and benefit no one but Washington. Until Washington and the U.S.-led NATO, who renounce the principle of equality and show no readiness to respect our security interests, abandon their profoundly hostile anti-Russian policy, strategic dialogue with the West remains pointless to Russia.
While the conditions for such dialogue are missing, Russia continues to take a number of relevant measures to reduce nuclear danger and maintain acceptable level of predictability and stability in the nuclear and missile sphere. Those include voluntary observance of quantitative restrictions on strategic offensive arms stipulated in the suspended New START Treaty, throughout its duration.
However, even such efforts may be undermined by Washington’s destabilizing policy. In particular, as the United States advances its plans to deploy its ground-launched intermediate and shorter-range missiles in different parts of the world, Russia’s unilateral moratorium on the deployment of similar systems is hanging by a thread. There are some other countries that will have to respond to Washington’s steps in this area. As a result, the chain of actions and reactions initiated by the United States will inevitably cause a new and extremely dangerous surge in negative dynamics.
In view of the above, Russia continues to insist that the disarmament issues, including the matters of nuclear disarmament, should be discussed exclusively within the general context of comprehensive strengthening of international security and stability. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
26 July, 2024. Cluster II: Non-proliferation and IAEA safeguards
Mr. Chairman,
The nuclear non-proliferation regime is one of the pillars of international peace and security. The IAEA Safeguards System plays a pivotal role in supporting it; it was established in accordance with the IAEA Statute, improved after the conclusion of the NPT and today has become universal. The NPT States Parties’ confidence in the IAEA Safeguards System is a key to ensuring resilience of the international nuclear non-proliferation regime in general. This confidence can be secured only if the mechanism the Agency applies to verify the States’ compliance with their non-proliferation obligations, is objective, technically sound and politically unbiased. The failure to meet these criteria has a most negative effect on the IAEA verification mechanism, and on the non-proliferation regime as a whole.
The safeguards system is intended to verify the compliance of the States Parties to the NPT with their non-proliferation obligations. The safeguards should be applied while respecting the sovereignty of States. Any attempts to use them for settling political scores or exercising external pressure undermine the credibility of the NPT’s verification mechanism and affect the Treaty itself adversely.
Russia closely follows the situation around the reform of the IAEA Safeguards System, which continues to cause our serious concerns. We are still expecting the Agency’s leadership to present an exhaustive report on the State-level concept clearly stating all the parameters of the reform, the procedure for applying the new approaches, the obligations and rights of the IAEA Secretariat and Member States. Let us remind that this report should be presented to the Agency’s Board of Governors for consideration and approval.
To our mind, at the moment, State-level approaches to safeguards implemented by the Secretariat remain purely experimental, leaving the States the right not to recognize any safeguards findings and conclusions derived from such approaches. We believe that only the verification measures and procedures provided for in the State’s Safeguards Agreement and Additional Protocol should be applied to this State (for those States that have signed them). The mechanisms determining the frequency and intensity of verification activities should be equally transparent for all Members without exception. They should also exclude the possibility of subjective assessments and rely on clear, measurable and statistically substantiated models. We emphasize that to make safeguards conclusions the IAEA Secretariat should take into account only the information, the credibility of which it is prepared to stand up for in an open discussion at the session of the Agency’s policy-making bodies.
We note the significance of Additional Protocols to IAEA Safeguards Agreements for ensuring confidence in the peaceful nature of all nuclear material in the country and the country’s nuclear activities. At the same time, it is our firm belief that concluding such additional protocols remains a voluntary step.
Russia supports the IAEA’s efforts to ensure resilience and improve the efficiency of the NPT verification mechanism. We have contributed money and expertise to this work, including through our national safeguards support program. For over 40 years of its history, significant work has been done to strengthen the conceptual framework and build technical capability of the Department of Safeguards of the IAEA Secretariat.
In particular, under this program Russia assists the IAEA by analyzing environmental samples collected by the Agency as part of its inspection activities, in Russian analytical laboratories. We pay considerable attention to training the IAEA inspectors, including in the conduct of inspections on facilities for isotopic separation of uranium and facilities using plutonium. We perform joint missions to elaborate approaches to verification for new types of nuclear plants, such as mobile nuclear power plants with small modular reactors, and to examine the feasibility of safeguards by design.
Mr. Chairman,
Russia has consistently supported addressing nuclear non-proliferation challenges exclusively through political and diplomatic means based on the NPT, in strict compliance with the norms of international law and taking into account the legitimate security and development interests of all States.
Nuclear-weapon-free zones (NWFZs) are an essential component of the non-proliferation regime. Establishing such zones is envisaged by Article VII of the NPT. We consider establishing such zones and nuclear-weapon States’ signing legally binding protocols on security assurances to the parties to such zones as a meaningful factor strengthening the non-proliferation regime and regional security and stability.
Russia has signed and ratified the protocols to the existing treaties establishing NWFZs in Latin America and the Caribbean (Treaty of Tlatelolco), the South Pacific (Treaty of Rarotonga), Africa (Treaty of Pelindaba), Central Asia (Semipalatinsk Treaty), thus providing security assurances against the threat or use of nuclear weapons to over one hundred States parties to such zones. While acceding to such protocols, Russia traditionally makes reservations that serve the purposes of clarity and do not affect the interests of States following the “letter and spirit” of NWFZ arrangements in good faith.
Such reservations to the protocols to the treaties establishing nuclear-weapon-free zones have been wholly justified, as the situation around the United States’, United Kingdom’s and Australia’s AUKUS deal has demonstrated, as one cannot exclude the possibility that as a result of such partnership nuclear-weapon States create their military infrastructure in the territory of a non-nuclear-weapon State party to the Treaty of Rarotonga.
We deplore that to this date, only one NWFZ has a full set of international instruments in force. I would like to stress that the protocols to the remaining NWFZ treaties have not been ratified by the United States. We call on Washington to complete the necessary internal procedures and thus strengthen the nuclear-weapon-free status of the impressive number of our planet’s regions that expressed such intention.
Mr. Chairman,
The issue of establishing a zone free from nuclear weapons and other weapons of mass destruction (WMD-free zone) in the Middle East as envisaged by the resolution of the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference, has always played special role in the NPT context. Russia, which co-sponsored the resolution, is fully conscious of the responsibility this status implies and intends to continue making all the necessary efforts to reach the objectives of this resolution.
We welcome the process of annual sessions of the Conference on a Middle East WMD-Free zone, which was launched by the UN General Assembly in 2018 and in which our country takes part as an observer. Many important substantive discussions have already taken place there, and many specific decisions have been made.
Certainly, this process can only be meaningful if it involves all Middle East countries excepting no one. In this context, we once again call on the United States, who co-sponsored the 1995 resolution, and Israel not to disregard the Conference, but rather take this opportunity to contribute their vision and engage in an open discussion on strengthening security in the Middle East. We emphasize that we regard the decision on establishing a WMD-free zone in the Middle East as an integral part of the arrangements concerning the NPT reached in 1995. We regret that the United States blocked the final document of the 2015 NPT Review Conference in order to prevent a language on the WMD-free zone.
We hope that the States of the region will manage to arrive at an arrangement on establishing such zone in the foreseeable future. For out part, we will provide all possible assistance to this work.
Mr. Chairman,
We would like to highlight the situation around the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). As far back as 1999, the United States Congress denied to ratify the Treaty under invented pretexts. Since then, Washington has made no practical steps in this regard. We view the allegations that the Treaty cannot be passed through the Congress as a poor excuse. Consequently, we have concluded that the American establishment is not interested in ratifying the CTBT.
Russia’s withdrawal of its ratification of the Treaty has become a natural response to the disparity in obligations with the United States. Nevertheless, we remain committed to the purposes and objectives of the CTBT and have recently completed our national segment of the International Monitoring System, the largest certified segment to date. We stand ready to return to the issue of the CTBT ratification as soon as the United States ratifies it.
Mr. Chairman,
Russia supports launching negotiations to elaborate a universal, non-discriminating, and effectively verifiable treaty banning the production of fissile material for nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices — the Fissile Material Cut-off Treaty (FMCT) — at the Conference on Disarmament.
At the same time, it should be understood that to achieve result, this process should be part of a comprehensive and balanced program of work of the Conference and strictly abide by the principles enshrined in the 1995 document CD/1299 (the so-called Shannon mandate). It is equally important that the negotiations involve all countries possessing capabilities for the production of weapon-grade fissile material.
We see that the FMCT, if it is ever to be elaborated, should aim at providing reliable guarantee that fissile material for nuclear weapons will not be produced globally. This is the only way to ensure the compliance with the principle of equal and indivisible security for all.
We emphasize that we believe statements on the possibility of transferring the FMCT negotiations from the Conference on Disarmament to another forum, to be destructive. In such a case the number of participants in the negotiations may be extremely limited.
Mr. Chairman,
We attach great importance to the implementation of Article III para 2 of the NPT. We believe that the activities of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) and the Zangger Committee, which was established as the NPT Exporters’ Committee, have demonstrated that there is practical possibility of establishing an agreed non-discriminating procedure of nuclear export controls. Russia arranges its national export control system in accordance with the Guidelines for Nuclear Transfers (INFCIRC/254). Russian legislation, including control lists, has been fully harmonized with this document. Regular updates are made to reflect the relevant changes introduced.
We believe that international non-proliferation efforts should not lead to unreasonable restrictions on legitimate trade in dual-use goods and technologies and on civil cooperation in the areas of science and technology.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The text of Mr. Mikhail Kondratenkov’s speech was published on the official website of the Russian Foreign Ministry: 25 July, 26 July.
UPD. Read more on the issue:
Key words: International Security; Nuclear Nonproliferation
NPT
F4/SOR – 24/07/29
