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Organization Offers Treaty Implementation Support By Chris Schneidmiller WASHINGTON — A British organization is offering a helping hand to nations struggling to meet their obligations under nuclear and biological weapons nonproliferation treaties (see GSN, April 13, 2004). The Verification, Research, Training and Information Center has prepared a manual of training materials on national laws and regulations required to comply with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty and Biological Weapons Convention. The organization is “road-testing” the material in a series of seminars, after which it plans to offer the finished document to interested nations. “Many states … haven’t necessarily been able to comply with their obligations because there just hasn’t been coordinated assistance available,” said Angela Woodward, VERTIC deputy director. “Many states are perhaps still unaware of the extent of their obligations, or are faced with a blank page, not quite knowing where to start or where to seek assistance.” Inadequate domestic laws can hamstring a nation’s efforts to investigate and prosecute illicit WMD activity within its borders, said Richard Guthrie, chemical and biological warfare project leader for the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute. Without regulations, for example, producing anthrax might not be considered illegal under any circumstances. Conversely, putting rules into place strengthens officials’ abilities to control potential weapons ingredients, and increases other countries’ confidence about sharing research materials. Assistance of the sort offered by VERTIC could be crucial for states with limited experience in dealing with nonproliferation treaties, Guthrie said. That might be particularly true for the Biological Weapons Convention, as there are legitimate purposes for working with materials covered by the pact. Guthrie noted as one example research into natural anthrax infections that kill cattle and damage the economy. Rules must be very precise about what sort of work is allowed and who has access to dangerous materials, he said. “It is very valuable to have assistance. A lot of these legal issues and procedures for national implementation are quite detailed and hard to get your head around,” said Guthrie, who worked at VERTIC from 1989 to 1996 but has no connection to this project. “If you don’t know where to start, you might say, ‘I think I’ll let that drop down to the end tray.’” Study Leads to ActionThe VERTIC project grew out of a survey the organization conducted over 18 months in 2002 and 2003 to determine how many Biological Weapons Convention member states had taken internal measures required by the treaty to prohibit the development, production and stockpiling of banned agents and weapons materials. Using the survey and open-source material, VERTIC researchers compiled information on 95 of the then-151 treaty states parties. The organization did not receive survey responses from 71 percent of BWC states parties in Africa, while 42 percent of treaty members in Asia and 25 percent in Oceania also remained silent. This indicated many nations and whole regions were without the required rules. Leaders might not be aware of the treaty requirements, or believe that biological weapons are not an issue in their country, Woodward said. There were other questions as well, such as whether the nations working toward compliance were including all treaty prohibitions in their legislation and whether their territories were covered by the rules. “The legislation that we obtained was oftentimes just the name of the legislation or a summary of what it was about,” Woodward said. The organization published its study on national legislation in November 2003, timed to appear alongside a meeting of Biological Weapons Convention states parties on the issue. Delegates left the meeting without offering any specific recommendations for improved treaty implementation (see GSN, Nov. 18, 2003). Passage in April 2004 of U.N. Security Council Resolution 1540 highlighted nations’ responsibilities in addressing the dangers of weapons of mass destruction. The resolution requires U.N. nations to adopt laws and domestic measures to prevent the spread of biological, chemical and nuclear weapons. States were faced with new obligations that many were not prepared to meet. VERTIC received more than $150,000 from the British Foreign and Commonwealth Office’s Global Opportunities Fund in hopes of helping to bridge that gap. The organization decided to focus its attention on the nuclear and biological arms treaties, along with the segments of Resolution 1540 covering those weapons, where support resources were limited for nations trying to come into line with regulations. There is no verification body for the Biological Weapons Convention that could offer such aid, Woodward said. The International Atomic Energy Agency oversees compliance with the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, but traditionally has not provided implementation assistance to nations, she said. The U.N. nuclear watchdog offers legislative and technical assistance, along with seminars to help states implement the agency’s safeguards agreements and Additional Protocols, according to IAEA documents. The Biological Weapons Convention requires members “to take any necessary measures to prohibit and prevent the development, production, stockpiling, acquisition, or retention of the agents, toxins, weapons, equipment and means of delivery” prohibited by the treaty. The Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty bans any action that would constitute proliferation and calls on member states to accept IAEA safeguards over their nuclear programs. Neither pact calls for specific national laws or regulations. Across the spectrum of arms control and disarmament treaties, national implementation measures generally include penal legislation to criminalize prohibited acts, export and import controls and other measures, according to Woodward. The manual is to contain basic information on the treaties and the obligations of state parties, checklists of requirements to be included in legislation and a model Biological Weapons Convention law to assist nations in developing their measures under that treaty. There will be no model NPT law, as treaty requirements are best implemented by multiple pieces of legislation, Woodward said. Included on a CD-ROM are the text of both treaties and Resolution 1540, documents from treaty meetings and some material also found in the hard copy of the document. “It gives the legislator a precise idea of what exactly he is supposed to do and when exactly he is supposed to do it,” Andreas Persbo, VERTIC nuclear arms control and disarmament researcher, said of the manual. The VERTIC manual also aims to include legislative-implementation material previously prepared by the International Atomic Energy Agency and the monitoring bodies for the Chemical Weapons Convention and the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. The organization conducted a seminar in November in which a small group of government officials, NGO representatives and academics were asked to evaluate the manual. The document received good marks, with the most significant recommendation being to change the presentation of the nuclear section for clarity. “The nuclear materials participants did say that it’s the first time they have seen all the nuclear obligations listed in such a way that they thought it’s doable,” Persbo said. Now under way is a series of seminars for diplomats in New York, Vienna and Geneva, with regional workshops aimed at relevant government officials tentatively scheduled for the Middle East in April and Southeast Asia in June. The seminars would serve to raise awareness of the obligations under the nonproliferation treaties and Resolution 1540, and to promote the resources available from VERTIC and other entities, Woodward said. Copies of the manual would then be sent to policy-makers and government officials. Accepting support from an independent organization could be more politically acceptable than receiving it from another nation, Guthrie said. Opposition lawmakers who might wonder why their government must go hat-in-hand to a country such as the United States are less likely to raise objections to simply seeking expert advice. An official with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations said he was not familiar with the VERTIC project, but that the organization would welcome support in promoting nonproliferation. All 10 ASEAN member nations belong to the Biological Weapons Convention and Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, but Termsak Chalermpalanupap did not say by e-mail how many are still trying to develop their domestic implementation measures. “Certainly we welcome projects that promote nonproliferation of all weapons of mass destruction and nuclear disarmament,” said Chalermpalanupap, special assistant to the ASEAN secretary general.
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