Nuclear weapon states

HEU De-Enrichment. Highly enriched uranium (HEU), initially enriched to >93% U, for use in research, naval reactors, and nuclear weapons, may be de-enriched and fabricated into fuel for civihan nuclear reactors. An estimate of the world inventory of highly enriched uranium in the nuclear weapons states is provided in Table 6 (34). 

More precisely, the model Additional Protocol is not for non-nuclear-weapon states party to the NPT only it is also opened for nuclear-weapon states as well as non-NPT states. See IAEA Model Protocol Additional to the Agreement(s) between State(s) and the International Atomic Energy Agency for the Application of Safeguards, IAEA Doc. INFCIRC/540, September 1997, foreword. 

The Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) is the single most important component of the non-proliferation regime. Under it, the 182 non-nuclear-weapon State Parties have committed themselves not to manufacture or otherwise acquire any nuclear explosive device and to accept IAEA safeguards on all source or special fissionable material to verify that commitment. Under it also the five nuclear weapon State Parties have committed themselves to embark on effective measures relating to nuclear disarmament. 

New supply arrangements for the transfer of source or special fissible material or equipment or material especially designed or prepared for the processing, use or production of special fissionable material to non-nuclear weapon States should require, as a necessary precondition, acceptance of IAEA full-scope safeguards and internationally legally binding commitments not to acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. 

Nuclear fissile material transferred from military use to peaceful nuclear activities should, as soon as practicable, be placed under IAEA safeguards in the framework of the voluntary safeguards agreements in place with the nuclear-weapon States. Safeguards should be universally applied once the complete elimination of nuclear weapons has been achieved. 

The CTBT was hammered out in the Conference on Disarmament, a 61-member international forum, beginning in January 1994. In that committee, the US, Russia, the UK, France and China (members of the nuclear club ) and a number of the non-nuclear weapons states worked together. Negotiations were greatly aided by behind-the-scenes efforts from a number of states, especially Australia, as well as by the diplomatic skills of the committee chairs. 

The UK and France were the first countries to develop civil nuclear energy in Europe building upon their separate experiences with gas cooled reactors devoted to military plutonium production. In the 1960s France altered its technology policy to favor pressurized water reactors while the UK did not make an equivalent policy choice until 1979 with policy implementation spanning the 1980s. France and the UK are the only EU-15 countries ever to have been nuclear weapons states and both states continue to maintain nuclear weapons capacity. 

Compare Article Vtll of the NPT, pursuant to which at least certain States (namely nuclear weapon States) must approve the amendment, with Article XV of the CWC, which differentiates between amendments to the Convention and changes to the Annexes. By contrast. Article XI of the BTWC is highly simplistic. 

The Type-J wipers are also used to take samples in a certain enrichment facility under safeguards in a nuclear weapons state. The wiper is inserted in a special metal fitting (a so-called Koshelev fitting) that is part of the pipe-work connected to the enrichment cascade. Therefore, this sample comes into contact with the UFe gas in the pipe-work and can be used to detect the presence of material with higher enrichment than declared. 

At present there are large stocks of plutonium in several countries. These have arisen from two sources. Firstly commercial thermal power reactors have produced large amounts of plutonium. In some countries this plutonium lies in the unreprocessed fuel in spent fuel stores in others, where the spent fuel has been reprocessed, it has been separated and stored. Secondly significant quantities of plutonium have been released by the decommissioning of nuclear weapons. The relaxation of the "cold war" in the last decade has seen a substantial reduction in the stockpiles of nuclear warheads held by nuclear weapons states, particularly the USA and the former USSR. The fissile material from these warheads is now also in store. 

Nonnuclear weapons states such as Australia, Argentina, Brazil, Canada, and South Africa do not want to get shut out of an enrichment market that will grow if nuclear energy enjoys a renaissance. Other states resent being denied access to additional nuclear technologies when they feel that they have not benefited from nuclear cooperation as it is, and the nuclear weapons states have not delivered on the original disarmament bargain." ... 

The Treaty originally was limited to 25 years duration, with provision for five yearly reviews, and consideration after 25 years of possible further extension. These provisions reflected the uncertainty among its sponsors when it was introduced. The very notion of international inspection of installations, which went close to the heart of what individual countries would regard as their most important security interests, was in the circumstances of the time (late 1960s) an amazing innovation. A number of countries held back from joining for a variety of reasons they still had ambitions to become nuclear weapons states (Argentina, Brazil, South Africa), they wanted to... 

The neutral and non-aligned states were already resentful of the special treatment afforded to the permanent members of the Security Council - the five nuclear weapons states - in other fields. Now they... 

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