A Leading Role for the Security Council
MOSCOW – In the past month, the world has witnessed something previously unknown: a common stand taken by America, Russia, Europe, India, China, Cuba, most of the Islamic world and numerous other regions and countries. Despite many serious differences between them, they united to save civilization.
It is now the responsibility of the world community to transform the coalition against terrorism into a coalition for a peaceful world order. Let us not, as we did in the 1990’s, miss the chance to build such an order.
Concepts like solidarity and helping third world countries to fight poverty and backwardness have disappeared from the political vocabulary. But if these concepts are not revived politically, the worst scenarios of a clash of civilizations could become reality.
I believe the United Nations Security Council should take the lead in fighting terrorism and in dealing with other global problems. All the main issues considered by the United Nations affect mankind’s security. It is time to stop reviling the United Nations and get on with the work of adapting the institution to new tasks.
Concrete steps should include accelerated nuclear and chemical disarmament and control over the remaining stocks of dangerous substances, including chemical and biological agents. No amount of money is too much for that. I hope the United States will support the verification protocol of the convention banning biological weapons and ratify the treaty to prohibit all nuclear tests though both steps would reverse the Bush administration’s current positions.
We should also heed those who have pointed out the negative consequences of globalization for hundreds of millions of people. Globalization cannot be stopped, but it can be made more humane and more balanced for those it affects.
If the battle against terrorism is limited to military operations, the world could be the loser. But if it becomes an integral part of common efforts to build a more just world order, everyone will win including those who now do not support American actions or the antiterrorism coalition. Those people, and they are many, should not all be branded as enemies.
Russia has shown its solidarity with America. President Vladimir Putin immediately sent a telegram to President Bush on Sept. 11 condemning the “inhuman act” of that day. Russia has been sharing information, coordinating positions with the West and with its neighbors, opening its air space, and providing humanitarian assistance to the Afghan people and weapons to the Northern Alliance.
This has been good policy. But we should bear in mind that both in the Russian establishment and among the people, reaction to it has been mixed. Some people are still prone to old ways of understanding the world and Russia’s place in it. Others sincerely wonder whether the world’s most powerful country should be bombing impoverished Afghanistan. Still others ask: We have supported America in its hour of need, but will it meet us halfway on issues important to us?
I am sure Russia will be a serious partner in fighting international terrorism. But equally, it is important that its voice be heard in building a new international order. If not, Russians could conclude that they have merely been used.
Irritants in American-Russian relations issues like missile defense and the admission of new members to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization will be addressed in due course, but they will be easier to solve once we have moved toward a new global agenda and a deeper partnership between our two countries.
Finally, it would be wrong to use the battle against terrorism to establish control over countries or regions. This would discredit the coalition and close off the prospect of transforming it into a powerful mechanism for building a peaceful world.
Turning the coalition against terror into an alliance that works to achieve a just international order would be a lasting memorial to the thousands of victims of the Sept. 11 tragedy.
Posted by elena_goss at 03:23 PM
October 17, 2001
Robert S. McNamara Calls for Nuclear Disarmament at United Nations
UNITED NATIONS — Delivering a clarion call for nuclear disarmament, former US Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara was the focal point of back-to-back sessions at the United Nations on October 17, 2001, including a high level luncheon for key ambassadors and a public presentation before an overflow crowd at the Dag Hammarskjöld Library Auditorium.
Global Security Institute President Jonathan Granoff, who introduced both events, noted that Secretary McNamaras words of experience from the Cold War were especially relevant as the world faces another “crisis of huge proportion.”
“Wisdom only grows from the crucible of experience, and there are few people on the planet who have as intensely gone through that crucicble as Secretary McNamara,” Mr. Granoff said.
Calling the attacks of September 11 “a wake-up call for all of us,” Mr. Granoff said that the events of that day were “an exclamation mark to say the Cold War is over. The good news is that borders mean less; the bad news is that borders mean less. None should doubt that this is the time to strengthen co-operative security, to strengthen the rule of law, to end the threats posed by these huge arsenals. The sense of emergency of this 911 call on the issue of nuclear weapons has not struck home yet.”
Part I: Luncheon with Ambassadors
The current United States and NATO nuclear policy is “absurdly dangerous” Mr. McNamara told some forty ambassadors, dignitaries and representatives from more than twenty countries at the luncheon. The event was hosted by the San Francisco-based Global Security Institute and co-sponsored by the UN Department of Disarmament Affairs, and began with remarks by Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs Jayantha Dhanapala.
Although Mr. McNamara praised recent pledges by President Bush to reduce the U.S. nuclear arsenal from its current 7,500 warheads, he said that even an exchange between arsenals reduced to 1,500 warheads each would be catastrophic. Furthermore, he said, the combination of launch-on-warning policy and human error make an inadvertent nuclear war a very real possibility as long as the weapons exist in their current deployment.
Mr. McNamara described the planned response of the United States government in the case of a detected launch of nuclear weapons against the United States. First, he said, the commander of the nuclear forces (who must always be “within three rings of a telephone”) would be informed. He or she must first decide whether the warning was reliable.
“Russia has received many unreliable warnings. We [the United States] receive many unreliable warnings,” Mr. McNamara said. “Youve got to decide whether to launch or not to launch” within only a few minutes.
The commander then makes a recommendation to the president, Mr. McNamara said. “And then the president is allowed maybe five minutes to think what the hell to do and whom to consult with. The American people? No way. The Congress? No way. The Cabinet? No way. Maybe possibly the Secretary of Defense and the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs and then he transfers his decision with the codes from that football [the Presidents brief case containing nuclear weapon launch codes] and theyre launched.”
Mr. McNamara blasted this situation and the public ignorance that he believes allows it to continue. “Now thats what weve gone through for 40 years. And thats where we are today. I think it is absolutely insane and I dont believe any of your people or any of our people who have good judgment would tolerate it if they knew it. They dont know it.”
A longtime advocate of the total elimination of nuclear weapons through verifiable treaty regimes, Mr. McNamara criticized U.S. plans for a ballistic missile defense system on two fronts. First, he said that deployment of such a system would threaten “strategic stability” by undermining deterrence, a doctrine that Mr. McNamara was instrumental in developing during his tenure as Secretary of Defense.
“Strategic stability does not require nuclear parity,” Mr. McNamara said. “At the time of the Cuban Missile Crisis, October 62, we had 5,500 strategic offensive warheads. We believed the Soviets had 350.” However, “stability existed, because we did not believe we could launch our 5,500 against their 350 and destroy so many of them that so few would be left that they couldnt inflict unacceptable damage. This is absolutely fundamental to security.”
Secondly, Mr. McNamara said, deployment of an elaborate ballistic missile defense system would be a clear indication of “our determination to maintain large offensive nuclear forces indefinitely.”
Because this intention is a “direct violation” of Article VI of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, which binds the five declared nuclear weapons states to eventual elimination of nuclear weapons, it will further undermine the nonproliferation regime, possibly leading to its collapse.
“And if it collapses, were not going to then have three aircraft bombs killing 7,000 people,” Mr. McNamara said, referring to the September 11 attacks on the World Trade Center and Pentagon. “Were going to have three nuclear bombs killing 7 million people. Very, very quickly after the collapse of the nonproliferation regime, there would be proliferation,” the result of a “latent, pent-up demand for nuclear weapons in many, many parts of the world.”
Therefore, Mr. McNamara called for the United States to work with other nations toward nuclear disarmament.
Mr. McNamara said that since the disasters of September 11 there has been “a dramatic change in U.S. foreign policy. Weve shifted from a unilateral policy toward a multilateral policy, and I hope to God we stay on that basis, not for months to come but for years and decades to come.”
Pakistani Ambassador Shamshad Ahmad took up that theme in the discussion that followed Mr. McNamaras remarks. He cited Albert Einsteins comment that “the fourth world war will be fought with rocks and stones.”
“This is a very meaningful message: that man has an innate tendency to fight and to use whatever he can use as a weapon,” Ambassador Ahmad said. “So the best and the ideal solution is to root out the causes of conflict.”
However, Ambassador Ahmad said, the United Nations is “faring no better” than Woodrow Wilsons League of Nations at this task.
Mr. McNamara concurred with Ambassador Ahmads assessment and called for a sweeping change of the United Nations structure to make it “an effective power in the world.”
The American people “are not yet ready to cede sovereignty as they see it to the UN,” Mr. McNamara said. Nevertheless, “were going to have to move in that way, and it requires all of us to help do it.”
Other participants included: Ambassador Shameem Ahsan of Bangladesh; Ambassador Mohamed Bennouna and Counsellor Mehiendine El Kadiri of Morocco; Ambassador David Boucher of Britain; Ambassador Richard Brown of the United States; Ambassador Altay Cengizer of Turkey; Ambassador Gerard Corr of Ireland; Minister Counsellor Tom Markram and Mr. John Dupreez of South Africa; Ambassador Ahmed Abul Gheit of Egypt; Mr. Wu Haitao of China; Ambassador Roberta Lajous of Mexico; Ambassador Yehuda Lancry of Israel; Counsellor Santiago Mourão of Brazil; Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ordzhonikidze of Russia; Minister Toshio Sano of Japan; Ambassador Pierre Schori of Sweden; Ambassador Fawzi Bin Abdul Majeed Shobokshi of Saudi Arabia; Mr. Joachim von Marschall of Germany; and Ambassador Chris Westdal of Canada.
Global Security Institute President Jonathan Granoff ended the luncheon with a final call to eliminate the arsenals which “constitute a terror under which we all live.”
Part II: Public Presentation
Following the luncheon, Mr. McNamara presented a keynote address entitled “Lessons for Today from the Cuban Missile Crisis” to delegates and non-governmental organizations in the Dag Hammarskjöld Library Auditorium.
In his introductory remarks, Under-Secretary-General Dhanapala said that the thirteen days that the crisis lasted represent “the firewall that was so important for us between the crisis and the outbreak of nuclear war. We need to have this political space of time for diplomatic efforts so that the prospect of nuclear war is distanced forever. We have treaties and in a sense they also represent the firewall between crisis and Armageddon. But the only sure way to eliminate Armageddon and the use of nuclear weapons is the total elimination of nuclear weapons.”
Indeed, Mr. McNamara said, the Cuban Missile Crisis “makes it quite clear that so long as we and other great powers possess large inventories of nuclear weapons, well face the risk of their use and the destruction of our nations.”
As a major player in the October 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis, he is certainly in a position to know. Mr. McNamaras speech traced the “misinformation, misjudgment, [and] miscalculation” that led the world to the brink of nuclear war exactly thirty-nine years ago. According to McNamara, before the Soviets moved missiles to Cuba, they thought the United States planned to invade the island. They also thought they could secretly move their missiles there and make them operational before the United States would find them. Meanwhile, the United States firmly believed that the Soviets would never move their missiles out of the Soviet Union.
Leaders on both sides continued to make dangerously false assumptions after the discovery of Soviet missile installations in Cuba triggered the crisis. As the United States staged an invasion in Louisiana in response to the Soviet refusal to remove the missiles, it did not know that the Soviet Union had already placed in Cuba 162 operational nuclear weapons, including 70 intermediate-range nuclear tipped missiles to shower the cities of the eastern United States. That information was not learned until years later.
The United States also underestimated standing Soviet forces by as many as 33,000 troops and failed to fully account for the 270,000 Cuban troops ready “to fight to their death.” Worse yet, the Kennedy administration, lacking accurate information about the scale of danger they faced, never imagined the kinds of decisions Fidel Castro was forced to make.
At a meeting on the crisis in 1992, Mr. McNamara asked President Castro about the nuclear weapons in Cuba. “I said, Mr. President, first, were you aware of the Soviet deployment of tactical nuclear warheads and the plans for their use; and secondly, what was your interpretation or expectation of the possible effect on Cuba?
“And Castros answer sent a chill up my spine. I can still feel it to this day. President Castro replied Now, we started from the assumption that if there was an invasion of Cuba, nuclear war would erupt; we were certain of that. Wed be forced to pay the price. We would disappear.”
“In addition to the two questions I had put to him, I asked him a third one,” Mr. McNamara continued. “If you did know about the weapons, would you have recommended to Khrushchev that he use them in the face of the US invasion?” Mr. McNamara explained that President Castro not only would have made such a recommendation, but “I did recommend it,” he said.
The U.S. leaders also did not realize that each of four Soviet submarines in the area carried one nuclear tipped torpedo to be used at the discretion of the commander of the submarine brigade, which would be out of contact with Moscow. The submarines were near the quarantine line, close to the U.S.S. Joseph P. Kennedy.
“My God, here is one guy out in the middle of the ocean authorized to start a nuclear war!” said Mr. McNamara. “What in the hell do you think we would have done if they had launched a nuclear weapon at the Kennedy? It defies understanding.”
Mr. McNamara emphasized that the force of the crisis threatened to overwhelm capable leaders on both sides, neither of which wanted a nuclear war. “We were all in an extraordinarily tense, ambiguous, volatile situation and nobody was in control, nobody! Events were slipping out of control.”
With the majority of President John F. Kennedys cabinet in favor of an October 25 invasion, only Premier Nikita Khrushchevs October 24 decision to withdraw the weapons in return for the withdrawal of American missiles from Turkey prevented the full-scale nuclear war.
“In the end, we avoided war not because [the crisis] was well managed, but because we lucked out, absolutely lucked out, on both sides,” Mr. McNamara said.
A lively question and answer period followed the speech. Mr. McNamara repeated his plea to “please, please stimulate discussion and debate” in order to bring the facts of the issue to the public and create a popular mandate for change.
In his closing remarks, Mr. Granoff offered specific suggestions for change, citing recent reports about mock terrorists penetrating security at half of the ten nuclear research and production facilities in the United States. Warning that not only states but “sub-states actors, criminal syndicates, all kinds of people” would now be seeking nuclear weapons capability, Mr. Granoff said that “its really time to get serious about” control of fissile material.
As participants filed out, Mr. McNamara leapt to the microphone again and, quoting T.S. Eliot, left the audience with an uplifting message of perseverance and hope:
“We shall not cease from exploring
And at the end of all our exploring
Will be to arrive where we started
And know the place for the first time.”
“Well, I havent known it yet, but Im still working on it,” Mr. McNamara said.
Posted by elena_goss at 11:12 PM
October 08, 2001
Statement before the First Committee of the General Assembly
I begin by congratulating you, Mr. Chairman, upon your election to guide the work of this Committee. Your distinguished career equips you well for the tasks ahead — a career that, in the disarmament area, features your prominent role in the historic 1995 Review and Extension Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) as well as your chairmanship of the Secretary-Generals Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters. I also congratulate the other members of the bureau and pledge the fullest support of the Department for Disarmament Affairs (DDA) in all your efforts to make this a productive session.
On 10 September 2001, the Secretary-General issued his annual Message on the eve of what was to be the International Day of Peace. He urged people everywhere to “try to imagine a world quite different from the one we know.” He called on everybody to “picture those who wage war laying down their arms and talking out their differences.” He stated that this “should be a day of global ceasefire and non-violence.” And he closed with these words of hope: “let us seize the opportunity for peace to take hold, day by day, year by year, until every day is a day of peace.”
The next morning, only an hour before the Secretary-General was planning to ring the Peace Bell, thousands of citizens from dozens of countries perished in acts of unmitigated brutality that defy description. The challenge now facing this Committee, as it convenes in the shadow of this dark and ominous cloud, is to confront these new and old threats to international peace and security. At this critical juncture when the peoples of the world stand together in repudiating mass terrorism we must all work together to build upon this remarkable display of unity. This is a time for cooperation, for reaffirming the rule of law, for recognizing common threats, and for acknowledging the extent to which our common security depends upon justice, fundamental human rights, and equitable development for all societies. For this Committee, it is particularly a time for reinforcing the roads and bridges leading to the fulfilment of multilateral disarmament commitments, while exploring new paths to reach the same destinations. It is, in short, a time to resume the work of realizing the vision described in the Secretary-Generals Message on the International Day of Peace.
Only history will decide how much of a defining moment 11 September will be. But history will certainly not absolve us for failing to learn the lessons of this unspeakable tragedy. Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in his address on 1 October to the General Assembly, stated “While the world was unable to prevent the 11 September attacks, there is much we can do to help prevent future terrorist acts carried out with weapons of mass destruction.” For us in the disarmament community he set out several guidelines for future actions that I hope delegations will consider carefully.
Some specific initiatives that merit serious consideration include:
* First, the need to expand the membership of the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, while strengthening controls over nuclear facilities and the storage and transportation of nuclear materials.
* Second, the need for new efforts to negotiate a convention for the suppression of acts of nuclear terrorism the recent terrorist attacks should add new urgency to these efforts.
* Third, the need for a global database based on publicly available material on acts, threatened acts, or suspected acts of terrorism involving weapons of mass destruction. The Department for Disarmament Affairs is in contact with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) on many of these issues and is prepared, if so mandated, to establish such a database.
Mr. Chairman, the starting point for the work of this Committee must be the sobering realization that last months tragedy could have been so much worse had nuclear, biological, or chemical weapons been used. The objective facts require that we be neither alarmist sowers of panic, nor complacent do-nothings. We do, however, have a duty to protect innocent citizens throughout the world by reinforcing the multilateral disarmament regime. Many of the deadliest super-weapons remain difficult to manufacture due to the unique characteristics of their weapons materials, improvements in methods of detecting the production or testing of such weapons, and technical problems in converting dangerous materials into effective, deliverable weapons. The world community must do all it can to raise these hurdles, while strengthening the fundamental norms against the possession or use of such weapons. The best way to accomplish this is through the active pursuit of a robust disarmament agenda. Of one thing we must be clear in the disarmament area there is no going back to business as usual.
The agenda of this Committee has always been challenging, yet the tasks ahead are more critical than ever. Many of these challenges, however, existed well before the tragic events of 11 September. At the conclusion of its 37th session in Geneva last July, the Secretary-Generals Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters concluded that “there currently exists a crisis of multilateral disarmament diplomacy.”
The symptoms of that crisis while numerous earlier in the year are now self-apparent even to casual observers. We are witnessing a weakening of the basic infrastructure of disarmament one of the eight priority areas in the United Nations work programme. This state of affairs if allowed to continue will threaten the very sustainability of disarmament as a means of enhancing international peace and security.
Disarmament is facing difficult times. There is no doubt that its future rests heavily upon a strong level of understanding and support in civil society. Yet today we see signs of private foundations and other funding agencies moving out of the field of disarmament or reducing their commitments to this goal. As funding grows scarce a problem aggravated by the turbulent global financial markets key groups in civil society are finding it increasingly difficult to sustain their work on disarmament issues. In academia, we find all too few articles in serious scholarly journals on disarmament per se and very few new doctoral dissertations that deal directly with disarmament. We find the news media focusing on the glare of current conflicts rather than the typically slow and incremental process of eliminating the weapons used in such conflicts or eliminating the weapons that could even destroy the world. These trends must be reversed, and at a minimum, more funding made available to non-governmental groups working in the field of disarmament.
On an inter-state level, we find few governments with offices specifically devoted to disarmament issues, and New Zealand still has the distinction of having the only minister of disarmament. We see a flourishing global arms market the U.S. Congressional Research Service estimates the total value of arms transfers from 1993 through 2000 at around $303 billion and almost 70 percent of these arms were imported by developing countries. Meanwhile, global military expenditures are again on the rise amounting last year to an estimated $800 billion. This growth in the arms trade and military spending contrasts with the terms of Article 26 of the Charter, which refer to the least diversion of the worlds human and economic resources for armaments.
At times it appears certainly in terms of the United Nations budgetary procedures that we are seeing instead the least diversion of resources for disarmament. It goes without saying that the smallest department in the United Nations is the Department for Disarmament Affairs, which is now seeking a modest increase in the 2002-2003 biennium budget that is before this session of the General Assembly. It is also not uncommon to read of financial problems and resource shortages in key treaty-based organizations like the IAEA and OPCW.
Two of the classic diplomatic measures for advancing disarmament, non-proliferation, and anti-terrorism goals export controls and sanctions are now in dispute, based on claims that they are ineffective, discriminatory, or harmful to other global values. The utility and legitimacy of these mechanisms requires that these criticisms be addressed, with a view to reaching universally-agreed guidelines. The danger remains that without them, the world community would find itself confronted with a stark choice between ignoring gross violations of global disarmament and non-proliferation norms and having to defend such norms by force of arms.
The treaties that constitute the global legal regime for disarmament are also seriously incomplete. None of the key treaties prescribing the elimination of weapons of mass destruction has universal membership, and un-documented allegations of non-compliance continue to be heard among the States parties, eroding confidence in the various treaty regimes. Many important treaties have still not entered into force, including START II and the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), whose members will soon meet in New York to consider ways of accelerating the ratification process. With respect to the Biological Weapons Convention (BWC), many years of efforts to conclude a protocol to strengthen this key treaty have ended abruptly. The treatys next five-year Review Conference, scheduled to convene next month in Geneva, provides an opportunity to revisit this issue. It must not be missed.
With regard to the NPT, while it is still too early to predict the fate of the “thirteen steps” to nuclear disarmament agreed at the NPT 2000 Review Conference, it is fair to say that delegates attending next years first Preparatory Committee meeting for the treatys 2005 Review Conference will certainly expect hard evidence of a good faith effort to implement each of these important goals.
The elimination of landmines is another very important international disarmament activity, given that they continue to impede the development and security of populations in almost one third of the worlds countries. Last month, I attended the third annual meeting of the States parties to the Mine Ban Convention in Managua, Nicaragua, convened by the United Nations pursuant to Resolution 55/33 V. Despite the uncertainties of air travel at the time, the event was marked both by an impressive attendance of more than 90 states and by positive results that augur well for the future implementation of this convention. The second annual conference of States parties to Amended Protocol II of the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) will take place later this year. It will consider several proposals addressing the scope of the convention, compliance issues, small calibre weapons and ammunition, anti-vehicle mines, and the problem of explosive remnants of war. The Secretary-General is committed to fulfilling his responsibilities as Depositary to both of these important legal instruments.
The global legal regime is particularly underdeveloped in the fields of conventional weapons, small arms and light weapons, preventing an arms race in outer space, and missiles and other delivery vehicles for weapons of mass destruction. Some of these problems, however, have been getting increased attention in recent years. General Assembly Resolution 55/33 A has asked the Secretary-General to prepare a report, with the assistance of a panel of governmental experts, on the issue of missiles in all its aspects, and to submit this report to the General Assembly at its 57th session. China has introduced in the Conference on Disarmament a proposal for a treaty banning the deployment of weapons in space. The Programme of Action successfully adopted at the July 2001 Conference on the Illicit Trade in Small Arms and Light Weapons in All Its Aspects provides a blueprint for international cooperation that may eventually lead to binding international norms. A question remains: will the events of 11 September encourage States to consider once again the need to prohibit the transfer of military-grade small arms and light weapons to non-state actors?
The chronic deadlock in the Conference on Disarmament — the worlds single multilateral disarmament negotiating forum — is another serious problem that demands an urgent solution, one that will be found only in the political will of Member States to begin negotiations. Perhaps the new spirit of cooperation that has been re-kindled by the events of 11 September will help to breathe new life into this vitally important international institution.
Taken alone, any one of these obstacles would be a cause for concern, but taken together, they suggest that disarmament is facing a very difficult road ahead. The crisis that disarmament is facing in multilateral diplomacy may reflect a deeper crisis of the nation-state system as it copes with the new forces of globalization. Large-scale terrorist events, and the possession or proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, are only two of a growing list of twenty-first century problems that are straining the capacities of political institutions that were developed in other historical contexts, while casting new doubts on the utility of attempting to solve such problems through the exercise of military might. As highlighted in the Millennium Declaration, the Road Map to implement that declaration, and the Secretary-Generals recent report on the work of the organization, the United Nations offers indispensable tools to address precisely such twenty-first century problems.
Despite the difficult challenges ahead for international peace and security, disarmament remains an attractive alternative to both deterrence and military defensive measures as responses to these challenges. One of the most important contributions of the United Nations in this field comes in the gathering and dissemination of information about worldwide progress in achieving important arms limitation and disarmament goals. On behalf of Member States, the DDA maintains the Register of Conventional Arms, which keeps track of the production and trade of seven categories of major weapons systems. This year more than a hundred governments made submissions to the Register, the highest level of participation since the Register was created nine years ago.
More Member States are also using the Standardized Instrument for Reporting Military Expenditures — this year, nearly 60 have reported data using this instrument, almost double the average number from previous years. Last July, the States attending the United Nations Small Arms Conference assigned the DDA the responsibility of collating and circulating data on the implementation of the Programme of Action agreed at that conference. DDAs role as the coordination centre in the Secretariat of all United Nations activities in the field of small arms was specifically welcomed in UNGA Resolution 55/33 F.
As requested by the General Assembly, DDA is also working with a group of outside experts to prepare a study on disarmament and non-proliferation education that the Secretary-General will submit to the General Assembly at its 57th session. These experts have met twice this year and are making progress in identifying constructive initiatives at the primary, secondary, university and postgraduate levels of education, in all regions of the world. Through its many symposia, newsletters, databases, monographs, films, posters, brochures, lectures to student groups, intern and fellowship programmes, a regularly-updated web site, and its new 454-page annual United Nations Disarmament Yearbook — DDA is giving its educational responsibilities every bit of attention they deserve, despite the heavy strain on its limited resources.
I would like to take this occasion to invite all members of this Committee to attend a special symposium on “Terrorism and Disarmament” that the DDA will host on the afternoon of 25 October, involving experts from the IAEA, the OPCW, and other institutions. This timely event will examine the specific contributions that disarmament can make in addressing global terrorist threats.
Mr. Chairman, this Committee faces the difficult task of moving beyond the tears, the grief, and the anger from 11 September and from all acts of terrorism in all countries to the re-establishment of a just and stable foundation for international peace and security. The Committee must adhere to its long-standing priorities it must keep its focus on discovering the ways and means of eliminating all weapons of mass destruction, especially nuclear weapons. As the Secretary-General stated in his message last month to the General Conference of the IAEA, “Making progress in the areas of nuclear non-proliferation and nuclear disarmament is more important than ever in the aftermath of last weeks appalling terrorist attack on the United States.” Though all terrorism is tragic and unacceptable, the United Nations must place its highest priority on eliminating threats that potentially affect the greatest number of people threats to international peace and security threats, in short, that arise from weapons of mass destruction.
The Committee has before it many resolutions that point the way ahead in achieving this basic aim. As it considers these resolutions, Member States may also wish to consider in their deliberations some broader questions that concern the disarmament machinery of the United Nations. Recent events, combined with the current crisis in multilateral disarmament diplomacy, may also suggest that the time has come to re-visit the proposal to convene a Fourth Special Session of the General Assembly on Disarmament.
There is one question, however, that surely does not belong on this agenda, and that is the question of whether the primary focus of this Committee should change from “disarmament” to merely the regulation or limitation of arms. There is of course an important need for efforts on both fronts. When it comes to weapons of mass destruction, there is no question that the world would be far better off pursuing the total and verifiable elimination of such weapons than in perpetuating the fantasy that their possession can be permanently limited to an assortment of exclusive, but by no means leak-proof clubs. By contrast, controls over conventional weapons are in general better pursued by transparent regulatory approaches that limit the numbers or characteristics of agreed weapons systems — approaches that are consistent with the inherent right of self defence in Article 51 of the Charter. Together, both approaches complement each other well in serving the common interest of international peace and security
Much ground has already been tilled. In their Final Document of the 2000 NPT Review Conference, the States parties reaffirmed their common conviction that “the total elimination of nuclear weapons is the only absolute guarantee against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons” and that includes a terrorist use of a nuclear weapon. Given the consequences of even a single use of a nuclear weapon, is international peace and security best preserved by partial or conditional guarantees, or by an absolute guarantee? The same question also applies to other weapons of mass destruction.
It is not at all unrealistic or inappropriate for this Committee to keep its focus on the search for absolute guarantees, and the more it searches, the more it will return to disarmament not regulation as the solution for weapons of mass destruction. In addressing such weapons, the Committee should explore ways of bringing disarmament to the world, or of bringing the world to disarmament, but disarmament must be done. As members of this committee, ask not for whom the Peace Bell tolls. It tolls for you.
Posted by zack_allen at 01:57 PM
October 01, 2001
The Secretary-General:
Address to the General Assembly on Terrorism
Mr. President, [Mayor Giuliani,] Distinguished delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen,
On Friday night, the Security Council adopted unanimously a broad resolution aimed at targeting terrorists and those who harbour, aid or support them. That resolution requires Member States to cooperate in a wide range of areas – from suppressing the financing of terrorism to providing early warning, cooperating in criminal investigations, and exchanging information on possible terrorist acts. I applaud the Council for acting so swiftly to enshrine in law the first steps needed to carry this fight forward with new vigour and determination.
Now all Member States must make greater efforts to exchange information about practices that have proved effective, and lessons that have been learned,
in the fight against terrorism — so that a global standard of excellence can be set. The implementation of this resolution will require technical expertise at the national level. I encourage states that can offer assistance in this regard to do so generously and without delay.
Thus far, the international community has been able to act with unprecedented speed and unity: On the 12th of September, both the General Assembly and
the Security Council adopted strong resolutions condemning the attacks and calling on all states to cooperate .in bringing the perpetrators to justice. Now, a second and more detailed resolution has been adopted by the Security Council, building swiftly on the first. Today, this august Assembly meets to deliberate its own response to the events of 11 September.
The reason for this response and unprecedented unity is clear enough. The terrorist attacks against the United States – resulting in the deaths of some
6,000 people from 80 countries — were acts of terrible evil which shocked the conscience of the entire world.
But out of evil can come good. Paradoxically, these vicious assaults on our common humanity have had the effect of reaffirming our common humanity.
The very heartlessness and callous indifference to the suffering and grief caused to thousands of innocent families has brought a heartfelt response from
millions of ordinary people all around the world, in many different societies.
The task now is to build on that wave of human solidarity – to ensure that the momentum is not lost, to develop a broad, comprehensive and above all
sustained strategy to combat terrorism and eradicate it from our world.
This important meeting of the General Assembly has a critical role to play in this. It must not be merely symbolic. It must signal the beginning of
immediate, practical and far-reaching changes in the way this Organization and its Member States act: against terrorism.
Today, the shock of this crime has united the world. But, Excellencies, if we are to prevent such crimes from being committed again, we must stay united as we seek to eliminate terrorism. In this struggle, there is simply no alternative to international cooperation. Terrorism will be defeated if the international community summons the will to unite in a broad coalition, or it will not, be defeated at all. The United Nations is uniquely positioned to serve as the forum for this coalition, and for the development of those steps Governments must now take – separately and together – to fight terrorism on a global- scale.
The global reaction to the attacks should give us courage and hope that we can succeed-in this fight. The sight of people gathering in cities in every part of
the world from every religion to mourn — and to express solidarity with the people of the United States — proves more eloquently than any words that terrorism is not an issue that divides humanity, but one that unites it. We are in a moral struggle to fight an evil that is anathema to all faiths. Every state and every people has a part to play. This was an attack on humanity, and humanity must respond to it as one.
The urgent business of the United Nations must now be to develop a long-term strategy, in order to ensure global legitimacy for the struggle ahead. The legitimacy
‘that the United Nations conveys can ensure that the greatest number of states are able and willing to take the necessary and difficult steps – diplomatic, legal and political.- that are needed to defeat terrorism.
Excellencies,
The Member States that you represent have a clear agenda before them. It begins with ensuring that the 12 conventions and protocols on international terrorism already drafted and adopted under United Nations auspices, are signed, ratified and implemented without delay by all states.
Two of these conventions, in particular, can strengthen the fight against terrorism.- First, the International Convention for the Suppression of Terrorist Bombings, which entered into force on 23 May this year; and second, the 1999 Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, which so far has 44 signatories and four ratifications. It requires eighteen additional ratifications to enter into force, and I hope it will now be seen as a point of honour for Member States to sign and ratify this vital convention as soon possible.
While no one imagines that these conventions – even when implemented — will end terrorism on their own, they are part of the legal framework needed for
this effort. I wish to propose to all Member States that they make it their first order of business during the General Debate to sign all the conventions on terrorism, and pledge to work for their ratification and implementation without delay.
It will also be important to obtain agreement on a comprehensive convention on international terrorism. In the post-11 September era, no one can disputethe
nature of the terrorist threat, nor the need to meet it with a global response. I understand that there are outstanding issues, which until now have prevented agreement on this convention. Some of the most difficult issues relate to the definition of terrorism. I understand and accept the need for legal precision. But let me say frankly that there is also a need for moral clarity. There can be no acceptance of those who would seek to justify the deliberate taking of innocent civilian life, regardless of cause or grievance. If there is one universal principle that all peoples can agree on, surely it is this.
Even in situations of armed conflict, the targeting of innocent civilians is illegal, as well as morally unacceptable. And yet, as I have stated in my two reports on the protection of civilians in armed conflict, civilian populations are more and more often deliberately targeted. Indeed, civilians have become the principal victims of conflict, accounting for an estimated 75 percent of all casualties.
This demands from all of us an increased attention to the civilian costs of conflict. It requires Member States to live up to their responsibilities under international law. They must deal firmly with the reality of armed groups and other non-state actors who refuse to respect common principles of human dignity.
Mr. President,
It is hard to imagine how the tragedy of 11 September could have been worse. Yet the truth is that a single attack involving a nuclear or biological
weapon could have killed millions. While the world was unable to prevent the 11 September attacks, there is much we can do to help prevent future terrorist acts carried out with weapons of mass destruction. The greatest immediate danger arises from. a non-state group — or even an individual -acquiring and using a nuclear, biological, or chemical weapon. Such a weapon could be delivered without -the need for any missile or any other sophisticated delivery system.
In addition to measures taken by individual Member States, we must now strengthen the global norm against the use or proliferation of weapons of
mass destruction. This means, among other actions,
redoubling efforts to ensure the universality, verification and full implementation of key treaties relating to weapons of mass destruction, including
those outlawing chemical and biological weapons and the nuclear non-proliferation treaty;
promoting closer cooperation among international organizations dealing with- these-weapons;
tightening national legislation over exports of goods and technologies needed to manufacture weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery;
and developing new efforts to criminalize the acquisition or use of weapons of mass destruction by non-state groups.
In addition, we need to strengthen controls over other types of weapons that pose grave dangers through terrorist use. This means doing more to
ensure a ban on the sale of small arms to non-state groups; making progress in eliminating landmines; improving the physical protection of sensitive industrial facilities, including nuclear and chemical plants; and increased vigilance against cyberterrorist threats.
Mr. President,
As we summon the will and the resources to succeed in the struggle against terrorism, we must also care for all the victims of terrorism, whether they are the direct targets or other populations who will be affected by our common effort. That is why I have launched an alert to donors about the potential need for much more generous humanitarian assistance to the people of Afghanistan.
This appeal is only the most urgent part of our determination to continue to care for those suffering from poverty, disease and conflict around the world. The work of the United Nations in promoting development, resolving long-standing disputes, and fighting ignorance and prejudice are even more important today than they were before 11 September.
The victims of the attacks on 11 September were, first and foremost, the innocent civilians who lost their lives, and the families who now grieve for them.
But peace, tolerance, mutual respect, human rights, the rule of-law-and the global economy are all among the casualties of the terrorists’ acts.
Repairing the damage done to the fabric of the international community – restoring trust among peoples and cultures – will not be easy. But just as a
concerted international response can make the work of terrorists much harder to accomplish, so should the unity born of this tragedy bring all nations together in defence of the most basic right – the right of all peoples to live in peace and security. This is the challenge before us as we seek to eliminate the evil of terrorism.
Thank you.
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