Det danske Fredsakademi
Kronologi over fredssagen og international politik 13. Mars 2006 / Time Line March 13, 2006
Version 3.503/13/2006
Viet Nam becomes the thirty-fourth Annex 2 State to ratify the
Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty
http://www.ctbto.org/press_centre/press_release.dhtml?item=275
Vienna, Austria, 13 March 2006 -
PI/2006/06: Viet Nam has deposited its instrument of ratification
with the United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan, in his
capacity as Depositary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty
(CTBT), on 10 March 2006. The ratification by Viet Nam signifies an
important step forwards, as Viet Nam is one of the 44 States listed
in Annex 2 of the Treaty whose signature and ratification is
necessary for the entry into force of the CTBT.
Viet Nam’s ratification brings the total number of
ratifications in South East Asia, the Pacific and the Far East
geographical region to 17 and worldwide to 132.
The CTBT bans any nuclear weapons test explosions or any other
nuclear explosions. Drafted at the Conference on Disarmament in
Geneva and adopted by the General Assembly on 10 September 1996,
the Treaty was opened for signature on 24 September 1996 at the
United Nations headquarters in New York.
176 States have signed the Treaty to date.
To enter into force, the CTBT must be signed and ratified by the 44
States listed in Annex 2 of the Treaty. These States formally
participated in the work of the 1996 session of the Conference on
Disarmament and possessed nuclear power or research reactors at
that time.
The 34 Annex 2 States which have signed and ratified the Treaty are
Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium,
Bulgaria, Brazil, Canada, Chile, the Democratic Republic of the
Congo, Finland, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Japan, the
Republic of Korea, Mexico, the Netherlands, Norway, Peru, Poland,
Romania, the Russian Federation, Slovakia, South Africa, Spain,
Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and Viet
Nam. The other Annex 2 States which have signed but not ratified
the Treaty are Egypt, China, Colombia, Indonesia, Iran (Islamic
Republic of), Israel and the United States of America. The
remaining three Annex 2 States which have neither signed nor
ratified the Treaty are India, the Democratic People’s
Republic of Korea and Pakistan.
03/13/2006
U.S. INTELLIGENCE AND THE SOUTH AFRICAN BOMB
Documents Show U.S. Unable to Penetrate Apartheid Regime's Nuclear
Weapons Program National Security Archive Update, March 13,
2006
Washington, D.C., 13 March 2006 - The U.S. Intelligence Community
failed to penetrate the veil of secrecy surrounding the nuclear
activities of South Africa's apartheid regime, particularly its
nuclear weapons program, according to documents obtained through
the Freedom of Information Act and archival research and posted on
the Web today by the National Security Archive at George Washington
University.
Included in the Archive posting are over thirty documents -- many
originally classified Top Secret/Codeword -- produced by
interagency groups, the CIA, and the State Department's Bureau of
Intelligence and Research (INR).
The documents were obtained by Archive Senior Fellow Jeffrey T.
Richelson, while conducting research for his forthcoming book,
Spying on the Bomb: American Nuclear Intelligence from Nazi Germany
to Iran and North Korea (W.W. Norton).
The documents show that years after South Africa claimed that it
had developed a new technique for uranium enrichment the U.S. was
uncertain as to what it entailed. In addition, the documents show
that in the 1980s the U.S. did not know the status of South African
bomb development. They also reveal a dispute between the Director
of Central Intelligence's Nonproliferation Center and State's INR
over the likelihood that South Africa's declaration to the
International Atomic Energy Agency constituted an honest
declaration or an act of deception. One possibility raised was
whether some of the fissile material was transferred to another
country. Since replacement of the apartheid regime by a majority
government no evidence has emerged that South Africa's declaration
to the IAEA was deceptive.
An interagency assessment does demonstrate that the Intelligence
Community did, in 1977, correctly assess, based on its
understanding of South Africa and the regime's leadership, that
while South Africa's entrance into the nuclear weapons club could
be delayed, it could not be prevented. In 1993, President F.W.
DeKlerk revealed that South Africa had, during the 1980s, built six
nuclear weapons and was in the process of building a seventh when
his government decided to halt the program and destroy the nuclear
devices.
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