By David Ruppe
Global Security Newswire

WASHINGTON — Reflecting its unwillingness to permanently renounce nuclear weapons test explosions, the Bush administration has decided not to attend an international conference in September to encourage other countries to adopt the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, officials told Global Security Newswire this week (see GSN, July 7).

“It didn’t seem appropriate for us, given our refusal to ratify the treaty, to go to this thing as a state party … [and] since we’re not playing ball, to be telling them to play ball,” said one U.S. official.

The United States is one of 13 holdout countries whose ratification is required before the treaty can take effect.

The 2003 Conference on Facilitating the Entry into Force of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is scheduled to take place in Vienna on Sept. 3-5.

“Given our decision with regard to the treaty it just didn’t make any sense to attend this particular meeting,” the official said.

“That has a logic to it,” said Daniela Rozgonova, public affairs chief for the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization, which administers the treaty and is organizing the conference.

She said the United States has not yet formally notified the organization of its decision, but that the move was no surprise because the United States boycotted the only previous such conference in 2001 (see GSN, Nov. 12, 2001).

“They told you more than they told us.  We sort of expected that something like that might come, but we were not informed yet,” she said.

The U.S. decision drew criticism from Daryl Kimball, executive director of the Arms Control Association.

“This is an acknowledgement of the limitations of the administration’s ‘Do as I say, not as I do’ nonproliferation strategy and a sad commentary on the administration’s commitment, or lack thereof, to take tangible steps to verifiably limit the nuclear weapons capabilities of other states,” he said.

“Furthermore, it begs the question of why the administration does not consider the CTBT or further limits on nuclear testing to be an essential part of the U.S. and global nonproliferation strategy.  Do they tolerate nuclear testing by India, Pakistan, or China or Russia?  This approach serves as a wink, wink, nod, nod to those states who choose to resume nuclear testing,” Kimball said.

U.S. Opposes Restrictions

Since the treaty was opened for signature in 1996, 162 states have signed on, and 102 of those have ratified the treaty.

Of the 44 specific countries that must ratify the treaty before it can enter into force, the United States is the only Western state out of 13 holdouts that include Algeria, China, Colombia, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Israel and Vietnam.  The holdouts also include India, Pakistan and North Korea which ot signed the treaty.

Former U.S. President Bill Clinton signed the treaty in 1996 but the Senate decisively opposed the treaty in a formal vote in 1999 and President George W. Bush has indicated that he opposes ratification.

The Bush administration this year requested and appears likely to receive congressional authority to shorten the preparation time necessary to resume underground testing from 36 months to 18 months.  Officials have said an 11-year U.S. moratorium on testing remains in place but have asserted that future testing might be needed to deal with unanticipated nuclear weapons stockpile problems or for developing new nuclear weapons (see GSN, May 14).

Critics have charged resuming testing is not necessary to maintain the stockpile and that the administration’s unwillingness to ratify the treaty, and its contemplation of developing new low-yield nuclear weapons that might require testing, undermine the treaty’s purpose and global enlistment efforts.

Administration Values Treaty Products

Despite opposition to the treaty’s ban, the Bush administration apparently continues to value much of the infrastructure created for implementing the treaty.  The United States remains the largest dues payer to the treaty organization and is a major contributor to the rapidly growing international system of nuclear test monitoring stations.

“As you know, we do participate in other meetings of the permanent technical secretariat insofar as they relate to the international monitoring system, in which we continue to participate,” the administration official said.

Rozgonova said the United States stands to benefit from the monitoring system.

“They are interested because though the United States has a lot of stations itself around the globe, they cannot have as many as we will have in this system that we are building,” she said.

The treaty organization has been working toward positioning 321 monitoring stations and 16 radionuclide laboratories in countries around the world to monitor for evidence of nuclear explosions.  More than 100 facilities are currently in place and the United States contributes nearly 40 of them.

“We appreciate the fact that the Americans indeed pay their contributions and support the buildup of the monitoring system,” Rozgonova said.

However, the Bush administration has withheld dues for funding the organization’s on-site inspection capabilities (see GSN, March 19, 2002).

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