As global tensions rise, nuclear-armed states are failing to meet their disarmament obligations under the Non-Proliferation Treaty, while recent conflicts risk accelerating proliferation.
This week in New York, diplomats from almost every nation have convened for the month-long 11th Review Conference (RevCon) of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). While the stakes could barely be higher, in the current environment of imperial aggression and rampant violations of international law, expectations are low.
Most states, including Australia, consider the NPT as a cornerstone of international law in relation to nuclear technology, weapons and disarmament.
The NPT is essentially a bargain struck between the states in the late 1960s that had nuclear weapons and those that did not. The first five nuclear-armed states – China, France, Russia/USSR, UK and US – World War II victors and permanent members of the UN Security Council with veto rights, made a legally-binding commitment to end the nuclear arms race and eliminate their nuclear arsenals; the only place where they have done so. In exchange, states without nuclear weapons agreed to forego them, with the sweetener of assistance in peaceful uses of nuclear technology.
While the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and its safeguards and inspections regime serve the non-proliferation parts of the NPT, there are no comparable organisation, timeframes, defined processes, verification or enforcement mechanisms to drive the disarmament side.
The five-yearly NPT RevCon cycles have been fraught. Consensus process means an outcome can be blocked by one state, and condemns agreements to rock-bottom lowest common denominator. In 2015 Canada, the UK and US blocked adoption of a painstakingly negotiated text at the behest of Israel, nuclear-armed and not party to the NPT, and at the 2022 conference (delayed due to Covid) Russia blocked adoption of the final text, mainly due to references to the Zaporizhzya nuclear power plant in Ukraine it attacked and occupied.
Of the three Preparatory Committee meetings preceding this year’s RevCon, only the 2024 meeting was able to adopt even a Chair’s summary.
Some states, notably Russia, have even disagreed whether decisions adopted apply beyond the next RevCon. Since 1995, only two RevCons have produced an agreed outcome document. In 2000, 13 practical steps to progress nuclear disarmament were agreed, however these remain almost completely unimplemented. In 2010, a 64-point action plan was agreed, but implementation has been variable and weak, particularly for the 22 actions relating to disarmament.
It was always envisaged that additional instruments would be required for disarmament, including for the now four nuclear-armed states outside the NPT. No specific disarmament agreement or outcome can be firmly attributed to the NPT, and the single greatest challenge to its future lies in the failure of nuclear-armed states, now 56 years after its entry into force, to uphold their side of the bargain by disarming.
Two recent developments cast further shadows across this year’s RevCon. Despite Russia’s unprecedented, ongoing attacks on nuclear power plants in Ukraine, risking a radiological disaster, the last (2022) RevCon agreed no measures to protect nuclear facilities from attack.
The second is the Israel-US attacks on Iran, including nuclear facilities, under false pretext of Iran’s claimed imminent production of nuclear weapons.
Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program and is a member of the NPT. It complied with safeguards until the first Israel–US attacks last June, and it was the United States that withdrew from the agreement limiting its nuclear activities. Despite this, Iran was attacked by two nuclear-armed states in actions illegal under the UN Charter, including Israel, which has never joined the NPT or accepted nuclear safeguards.
Despite going to war over Iran’s uranium enrichment, President Trump has supported Saudi Arabia and South Korea enriching uranium and reprocessing spent fuel to extract plutonium. Not surprisingly, Iran has threatened to leave the NPT.
These attacks are a serious setback to nuclear governance. Non-proliferation cannot be secured by war. The risk of Iran and others following North Korea in acquiring nuclear weapons to prevent military aggression and regime change has been raised by the Israeli-US attacks.
Australia’s role
The NPT makes no distinction between states parties with and without nuclear weapons in relation to its nuclear disarmament obligation. The International Court of Justice has affirmed that this obligation applies to all states.
Australia claims the NPT is central in its efforts for nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. Officials use the NPT as a figleaf to justify the government’s failure to yet join the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), as Labor’s National Policy Platform has committed since 2018, consistent with Australia previously joining, under both Coalition and Labor governments, every other treaty banning a weapon of mass destruction or other inhumane weapon.
If we follow what Australia does rather than simply what we say, then like 32 other nuclear ‘complicit’ or ‘umbrella’ states – NATO members, Japan, South Korea and Belarus, Australia contributes more to nuclear weapon dangers than to reducing them. These nations justify nuclear possession as a claimed national security asset, retarding disarmament and acting as an incentive to proliferation, and envision circumstances where they regard use of nuclear weapons as legitimate.
Most also provide assistance for the possible use of nuclear weapons through participating in nuclear planning and exercises, and/or hosting communication and intelligence facilities integral to nuclear targeting, command and control. Belarus, Belgium, Germany, Italy, Netherlands and Türkiye hosting nuclear weapons on their soil undermines the NPT’s bargain. They, and from later this year, Australia, also provide operational support, providing or hosting aircraft capable of delivering nuclear weapons. These arrangements violate the purpose and spirit of the NPT if not always its legal letter.
While Australia criticised Russia’s attacks on Ukraine’s nuclear facilities, shamefully, it supported the recent Israeli-US attacks on Iran, despite the IAEA drawing attention to the great risks of attacking nuclear facilities or risking disruption to the essential power and water for cooling, urging against such attacks and for negotiations. This support also doesn’t rest well with Australia having joined the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material. Australia currently chairs the IAEA Board of Governors, which has also been inconsistent in condemning Russia’s attacks on nuclear facilities, but not those by Israel and the US.
Australia claims to support minimisation of fissile material which can be used to build nuclear weapons (HEU and plutonium) and negotiating a treaty curbing their production. However, these claims are contradicted by Australia’s plan to buy and build nuclear-powered submarines using weapons-grade HEU as fuel – up to 20 nuclear weapons worth per submarine.
Even the spent fuel, to remain in Australia, will still be weapons-usable for many millenia. Australia plans to be the first nation to exploit a previously dormant IAEA provision that allows nuclear material to be taken out of safeguards for a time for non-explosive military uses. Applying effective safeguards to stealthy mobile platforms which spend most of their time hidden is a problem the world doesn’t need. Australia’s precedent is already being followed by South Korea. Iran, too, has expressed interest in nuclear-powered submarines. Brazil’s indigenous nuclear-powered submarine development is of far less proliferation concern, as Brazil’s planned submarines, like Chinese and French ones, will be powered by low-enriched uranium, unusable for weapons without further enrichment.
Through its plans to permanently host nuclear-capable B-52 bombers, and US submarines planned to again become nuclear-capable in the next several years, Australia is on the cusp of adding operational deployment support to its long-standing communications, intelligence and staffing support for possible use of US nuclear weapons. If Australia really wants to help disarmament and non-proliferation in this dark time of unprecedented nuclear dangers, we should end lip service to the NPT, draw a red line on nuclear weapons in our own policies, sign the TPNW in this term of government, keep nuclear weapons out of Australia and end assistance for their possible use, just as other US allies New Zealand, the Philippines and Thailand have done.
Tilman Ruff AO is immediate past Co-President and a board member of International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (Nobel Peace Prize 1985); and co-founder and founding international and Australian Chair of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), awarded the 2017 Nobel Peace Prize, the first to an entity born in Australia. He is Hon Principal Fellow in the School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, and a member of the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons Scientific Network.