Ministry Statements & Speeches:
Thank you Chair.
1. I take the floor on behalf of the New Agenda Coalition, Brazil, Ireland, Egypt, Mexico, South Africa and my own country New Zealand.
2. As highlighted in our General Debate statement, we are deeply concerned about current levels of nuclear danger.
3. Faced with escalating risks of nuclear conflagration, all States Parties of the NPT – nuclear-weapon States and non-nuclear Weapon States alike – should recall their grave concern about the catastrophic consequences of any nuclear weapons use.
4. A nuclear war would have catastrophic humanitarian consequences exceeding any State’s capacity to respond. Its effects would transcend national borders and have multi-generational effects on human health, with clear gender-specific impacts, and the environment, resulting in a breakdown to the global food supply and the collapse of ecosystems, amongst other devastating impacts.
5.The risk of nuclear weapons use will continue to exist for as long as nuclear weapons exist. Any approach to prevent or manage such risks needs to acknowledge this reality and proceed from this starting point in order to be credible. Nuclear weapons do not and cannot exist without the ever-present risk of their use, be it by decision or by accident.
6. Nuclear deterrence is posited on the very existence of nuclear risk. It assumes that possession and preparation for use of nuclear weapons will both signal resolve and instil fear in adversaries that induces a desired level of caution on their part. Paradoxically, nuclear deterrence both seeks to underline the horrific consequences of nuclear weapon use, while also downplaying these.
7. Claims to be able to manage nuclear risks permanently are illusory. The level of control required over multiple variables that contribute to nuclear risks is simply unattainable.
8. One reason for this is the fallibility of human decision-making. We lack both the ability to assess probabilities across complex systems, and events with large consequences. Any decision to use nuclear weapons would be by its very nature both complex and highly consequential.
9.If proof of this were needed, it is telling that the numerous assessments of nuclear conflagration or hypothetical scenarios of use are usually focused solely on first- or single-use cases. Yet the escalation ladder after any nuclear use is likely going to be rapid and potentially non-linear.
10. The history of nuclear weapons is littered with close calls, where early warning or nuclear command and control failed; occasions on which nuclear-weapon States misread each other’s intentions and became ensnared in an escalation spiral; and serious nuclear weapon safety incidents.
11. In some of these cases it appears we only narrowly avoided nuclear weapon detonations and even global devastation.
12. Scientists, first responders, and international organisations are clear that there is no adequate response capacity anywhere in the world that could manage in the event of nuclear weapons use in a populated area, let alone the detonation of multiple warheads in a full-scale nuclear war.
13. In the face of this grave danger, all States that still rely on nuclear weapons for their security should take immediate action to reduce their reliance on these weapons.
14. It should be recalled that, thanks in part to the provisions of this Treaty, a majority of countries have rejected nuclear weapons as a basis for their security.
15. In our Working Paper presented to this Preparatory Committee (Working Paper 2), we recommended States take the following actions to reduce current levels of nuclear weapons danger.
i. To reaffirm the validity of existing Treaty obligations and commitments, in particular the nuclear-weapon States’ unequivocal undertaking to accomplish the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals, and re-commit to their full and urgent implementation.
ii. To continue condemning all nuclear threats, whether implicit or explicit, as illegitimate, inadmissible and dangerous.
iii. To urge all non-nuclear-weapon States that host nuclear weapons on their territory to acknowledge the elevated levels of risk involved with such arrangements and seek to put an end to them.
iv. To call on Russia and the US, which still maintain nuclear weapons on high alert, to mutually agree to remove them from hair-trigger status, with immediate effect.
v. To urge nuclear-weapon States to firewall discussions on nuclear disarmament and arms control from other issues, in view of the importance and urgency of reducing current levels of nuclear danger.
vi. To call on all States to clearly acknowledge the catastrophic consequences of any nuclear weapons use and to support new, cross-disciplinary scientific research; and
vii. To call on nuclear-weapon States to declassify historical information of instances of nuclear “close calls”.
16. Furthermore, we identified the following concrete steps which States – especially the nuclear-weapon States – could take as contributions to strengthening the guardrails preventing nuclear escalation.
i. High-level political statements on nuclear restraint and the inadmissibility of any nuclear weapons use.
ii. Assurances that nuclear weapons will not be used, or their use threatened, against non-nuclear weapon States under any circumstances.
iii. Doctrinal restraint, for example “no first use” policies or defensive-only postures, and commitments to de-target and de-alert nuclear weapons.
iv. Commitments to refrain from qualitative and quantitative nuclear build-ups.
v. For the US and Russia to re-engage on negotiations for a successor Treaty to New START that achieves deeper reductions in deployed and stored nuclear arsenals.
vi. Refrain from actions that may weaken the disarmament and non-proliferation architecture or undermine key norms.
vii. For the remaining States not-party to join the Treaty as non-nuclear weapon States, without delay or preconditions.
viii. For nuclear-weapon States to set out clear, transparent and measurable plans with defined timelines for how they will fulfil their disarmament obligations and commitments, and to submit this for peer review during formal sessions of the Treaty.
ix. For all States to respect existing legal obligations and related commitments regarding nuclear weapons, whether they stem from this Treaty or other related Treaties such as the Outer Space Treaty, the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty or the Treaty on the Prohibition on Nuclear Weapons.
17. None of these actions are substitutes for concrete disarmament actions. However, they could potentially stimulate progress towards fulfilling our obligations and commitments under Article VI of the Treaty, including as confidence-building measures. We are putting them forward in this spirit.
I thank you.