The United Nations General Assembly will vote this week on a resolution, initiated by Ireland and Sweden, calling on the nuclear powers to bring to a conclusion "without delay" talks to eliminate their nuclear weapons arsenals.
The resolution, which is likely to be passed by a large majority on Thursday, represents the first significant UN initiative on nuclear weapons since the end of the Cold War.
It resulted from soundings made early this year by the Minister for Foreign Affairs, Mr Andrews, and his Swedish counter part. In June they were joined in a public announcement of the initiative by the foreign ministers of six more countries - Brazil, Egypt, Mexico, New Zealand, Slovenia and South Africa.
On October 13th, the resolution was adopted by the UN's First Committee, which deals with disarmament, by 97 votes to 19, with 32 abstentions. Four of the five major nuclear powers - the United States, Russia, Britain and France - voted against, while China abstained.
The US lobbied hard against the resolution in the First Committee, and has continued to do so in the run-up to this week's vote. This did not prevent a number of its non-nuclear NATO allies, such as Canada, Germany, Spain and Italy, from abstaining last month.
The resolution now goes to the General Assembly. It calls for a "a new international agenda to achieve a nuclear weapon-free world", both through multilateral measures and through the START negotiations between the US and Russia.
It calls on "the nuclear-weapon states to demonstrate an unequivocal commitment to the speedy and total elimination of their respective nuclear weapons and without delay to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to the elimination of these weapons, thereby fulfilling their obligations under Article 6 of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons."
The resolution also calls on the nuclear-weapon states to "examine further interim measures" and to "review strategic doctrines". This is aimed at persuading NATO in particular to adopt a "no first use" of nuclear weapons strategy, a position urged by Germany's new Green Foreign Minister, Mr Joschka Fischer.
The sponsoring countries expect a larger vote in favour at the General Assembly, because of a higher turnout of ambassadors. They believe such a vote will lay down an important marker for the review conference of the 1968 Non-Proliferation Treaty, due in 2000.
"This is a wake-up call to the great powers that the international community has strong expectations of progress towards nuclear disarmament," a Government source said yesterday. "Despite significant reductions in the nuclear weapons arsenals of both the US and Russia, there is no commitment by them to the early elimination of those weapons. If they don't disappear soon, there will be a real problem, since many countries now have the capacity and the science to develop them."