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The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and the International Atomic Energy Agency

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 May 2009

George H. Quester
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Extract

The United States and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics have put forward a Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) designed to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons beyond those five nations which currently possess them: France, the People's Republic of China (Communist China), the Soviet Union, the United Kingdom, and the United States. The treaty requires that signatories already possessing such weapons not give them to other countries and that signatories not yet posses-sing nuclear weapons forego accepting them or manufacturing them indigenously. To reinforce the latter restraint the treaty obligates states renouncing weapons to accept inspection safeguards on their peaceful nuclear activities, inspection by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA).

Type
Research Article
Information
International Organization , Volume 24 , Issue 2 , Spring 1970 , pp. 163 - 182
Copyright
Copyright © The IO Foundation 1970

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References

1 For a basic discussion of IAEA see Kramish, Arnold, The Peaceful Atom and Foreign Policy (New York: Harper and Row, 1963)Google Scholar and Scheinman, Lawrence, International Conciliation: Nuclear Safeguards, the Peaceful Atom, and the IAEA, 03 1969 (No. 572)Google Scholar.

2 For prognoses on the growth and spread of nuclear electrical and plutonium capacity see Beaton, Leonard, Must the Bomb Spread? (London: Penguin Books [for the Institute of Strategic Studies], 1966).Google Scholar

3 For Japanese complaints on IAEA nuclear safeguards see Atoms in Japan (Tokyo: Japan Atomic Industrial Forum, 02 1968), pp. 3–5Google Scholar.

4 Interviews in Brussels, Washington, and Vienna.

5 See Kramish, p. 185.

6 For a much fuller discussion of American attitudes on halting proliferation see Bader, William B., The United States and the Spread of Nuclear Weapons (New York: Pegasus [for the Center of International Studies, Princeton University], 1968)Google Scholar.

7 See Scheinman, , International Conciliation, No. 572, pp. 17–25.Google Scholar

8 See “Final Document of the Conference of Non-Nuclear-Weapon States,” UN Document A/7277.

9 A similar argument is presented by Finkelstein, Lawrence S., “New Trends in International Affairs,” World Politics, 10 1965 (Vol. 18, No. 1), pp. 117–126CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

10 See Kramish, Arnold, The Watched and the Unwatched (Adelphi Papers, No. 36) (London: Institute for Strategic Studies, 06 1967)Google Scholar.

11 Interviews in Vienna.

12 Estimates of electrical capacities and inspection requirements can be found in U.S. Senate, Foreign Relations Committee, Hearings on the Nonproliferation Treaty, 90th Congress, 2nd Session, 1968, pp. 277–288Google Scholar.

13 The text of the IAEA Statute which was signed in New York on October 26, 1956, and entered into force on July 29, 1957, can be found in United States Department of State, American Foreign Policy: Current Documents, 1956 (Department of State Publication 6811) (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1959), pp. 915–933Google Scholar. The safeguards system, approved by IAEA's Board of Governors on January 31, 1961, is contained in IAEA Document INFCIRC/26, March 31, 1961, and their amendments made on September 28, 1965, appear in IAEA Document INFCIRC/66, December 3, 1966. The safeguards system and amendments can also be found in United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Documents on Disarmament, 1961, pp. 21—33Google Scholar, and Documents on Disarmament, 1966 (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1966), pp. 446–460, respectivelyGoogle Scholar.

14 For a discussion of the early workings of the IAEA safeguards seeWillrich, Mason, “Safeguarding Atoms for Peace,” American journal 0f International Law, 01 1966 (Vol. 60, No. 1), pp. 35–54Google Scholar.

15 A much more comprehensive discussion of the treaty's legal ambiguities can be found in Willrich, Mason, “The Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons: Nuclear Technology Confronts World Politics,” Yale Law Journal, 07 1968 (Vol. 77, No. 8), pp. 1447–1519CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 For example, in the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America (the Tlatelolco Treaty) of February 14, 1967, IAEA is entrusted with the task of establishing a Latin American system of safeguarding peaceful nuclear activities but not of verifying that no nuclear weapons are to be found on the landscape. United States Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, Documents on Disarmament, 1967 (Washington: U.S. Government Printing Office, 1968), pp. 69–83Google Scholar.

17 See Resolution L in the “Final Document of the Conference of Non-Nuclear-Weapon States,” UN Document A/7277.