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Excerpted from the Inventory of International Organizations
and Regimes 2001 published by the CNS International Organizations and Nonproliferation
Project. A complete PDF copy of the 2000 edition of the Inventory is available in the Publications section of the NTI website.
Date of adoption: 3 March 1980.
Entered into force: 8 February 1987.
The Convention does not set any limits on its duration.
Number of Signatories: 45.
Number of Parties: 68 states and EURATOM.
Depositary: IAEA Director-General.
Provisions: Provisions of the Convention oblige parties to
ensure that during international transport across their territory or on ships or
aircraft under their jurisdiction, nuclear materials for peaceful purposes
(plutonium, uranium 235, uranium 233 and irradiated fuel) are protected at the
agreed levels, as categorized in Annexes I and II and specified in IAEA
INFCIRC/225. Under certain conditions, the Convention shall also apply to
nuclear material used for peaceful purposes while in domestic use, storage, and
transport.
Parties undertake not to export or import nuclear materials or to allow
their transit through their territory unless they have received assurances that
these materials will be protected during international transport in accordance
with the levels of protection determined by the Convention. Parties agree to
share information on missing nuclear materials to facilitate recovery
operations.
Robbery, embezzlement, or extortion in relation to nuclear materials, and
acts without lawful authority involving nuclear materials, which cause or are
likely to cause death or serious injury to any person or substantial damage to
property, are to be treated by states parties as punishable offenses. These
offenses shall be deemed to be extraditable offenses in any extradition treaty
existing between states parties. States parties undertake to include those
offenses as extraditable offenses in every future extradition treaty to be
concluded between them.
Scope of application: The Convention establishes levels of
physical protection of nuclear material used for peaceful purposes while in
international transport and also provides for measures against unlawful acts
with respect to such material while in international transport as well as in
domestic use, storage and
transport.[1]
Reservations: Several States Parties, including Argentina,
Belarus, China, Cuba, Cyprus, France, Guatemala, Indonesia, Israel, Pakistan,
Peru, Republic of Korea, Romania, the Russian Federation, South Africa, Spain,
and Turkey declared that they were not bound by the provision of Article 17,
paragraph 2, which provided for the submission of disputes to arbitration or
their referral to the International Court of Justice in the case of inability to
resolve the dispute on the basis of negotiations between the States Parties.
Review Conferences: Article 16 obligated the States Parties
to convene in five years after the entry into force of the Convention to review
its implementation and its adequacy to the preamble, the whole of the operative
part and the annexes in the light of the then prevailing situation.
2001. In February 2001 the Fourth Working Group meeting of the
Informal Open-Ended Expert Meeting to discuss whether there was a need to revise
the Convention was held. It adopted a Final Report, in which the working group
recommended to strengthen the existing Convention by a well-defined amendment,
which would cover, among others, domestic use, storage and transport of nuclear
material with the exclusion of nuclear material and nuclear facilities for
military use, mandatory international oversight, periodic national reporting,
peer reviews and mandatory use of INFCIRC/225. It also recommended drafting a
resolution for the IAEA General Conference with the aim of strengthening the
physical protection regime.
The June 2001 Informal Open-Ended Expert Meeting adopted this Final Report.
The meeting concluded that an amendment to strengthen the Convention should be
drafted and then be reviewed by the States Parties with the view to determine if
it should be submitted to an amendment conference. It also recommended to the
Director-General of the IAEA to convene a group of legal and technical experts
to draft such an amendment.
2000. On 22-24 February 2000, the First Working Group meeting to
discuss whether to revise the Convention took place in Vienna. The meeting
participants decided to establish five working sub-groups on different related
matters, including illicit trafficking and physical protection assistance. The
Second Working Group meeting, convened on 26-30 June 2000, discussed five
working papers related to the competency of the five working sub-groups
established at the First meeting.
In May 2000, the Review Conference of the Nonproliferation Treaty, in its
Final Document, noted the paramount importance of effective physical protection
of all nuclear material, the need for strengthened international cooperation in
physical protection, and called on all States to maintain the highest possible
standards of security and physical protection of nuclear materials. The
Conference urged all States that have not yet done so to adhere to the
Convention on the earliest possible date and to apply, as appropriate, the
recommendations on the physical protection of nuclear material and facilities
contained in IAEA document INFCIRC/225/Rev.4
(Corrected)[2] and in other relevant
guidelines. It welcomed the ongoing informal discussions among legal and
technical experts, under the aegis of IAEA, to discuss whether there is a need
to revise the Convention.
On 20-24 November 2000, the Third Working Group meeting of the Informal
Open-Ended Expert Meeting to discuss whether there was a need to revise the
Convention was held in Vienna. The meeting was convened to discuss and review
several papers presented by the IAEA and member states. The Working Group
recommended that a draft resolution on wider adherence to the Convention should
be presented to the IAEA General Conference in 2001. It also recommended that
the IAEA create Standing Advisory Group on security.
1998-1999. In response to the request of some States party to the
Convention to hold a meeting to discuss whether there is a need to revise the
Convention, the Director General of the IAEA decided to convene an Informal
Open- Ended Expert Meeting at the IAEA Headquarters in Vienna from 15-19
November 1999. The Meeting considered proposal by UK, France Germany, Belgium
and Sweden to look more broadly at the question. The Meeting concluded that the
next meeting should be held in May 2001, and before that, a working group should
be established to make recommendations to the Expert Meeting.
1997. In September 1997, members of the IAEA Board of Governors
voiced support to move towards a possible review of the Convention. It was
suggested that the Agency should consider the possibility of convening a meeting
of interested states to address the issues involved in such a review. It was
agreed that in case of a sufficient support for such a meeting, it would be
convened in 1998.
1996. The participants of the Moscow Nuclear Safety and Security
Summit in April 1996 recognized the importance of effective nuclear material
accounting and control and physical protection and fundamental responsibility of
nations to ensure the security of all nuclear material in their possession and
the necessity for effective national systems for nuclear accounting, control,
and physical protection. They urged all States that had not yet done so to
ratify the Convention on the earliest possible date.
1992-1993. The first Review Conference, attended by 35 states
parties, was held from September 29 to October 1, 1992, in Vienna. The Review
Conference unanimously expressed its full support for the Convention and urged
all States to take action to become party to the Convention. The conference
reaffirmed that the Convention provides a sound basis for the physical
protection of the transport of nuclear material, the recovery and return of any
stolen material, and the application of sanctions against any person who may
commit criminal acts involving nuclear material; and concluded that no changes
were needed in the Convention. The Conference also called upon the IAEA to
organize a meeting to examine the IAEA physical protection recommendations in
IAEA document INFCIRC/225/Rev. 2, and to consider the incorporation of further
guidance on such issues as irradiated fuel, nuclear material contained in waste,
and other matters. As a result of a Technical Committee meeting in June 1993,
revised recommendations were issued in September 1993 (as INFCIRC/225/ Rev.3)
that reflect the Committee's views in these respects.
[1] The Convention's physical protection measures are applied primarily for nuclear
material in international transport. At the time of the negotiation of the
Convention, states believed that physical protection in the domestic sphere
should be subject to national standards.
[2] The series of the IAEA documents INFCIRC/225Rev.1, Rev.2, Rev.3, and Rev.4
represents the existing international consensus guidelines and recommendations
intended to apply to the physical protection of nuclear material in use, storage
and transport, whether domestic or international and whether peaceful or
military.
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