The United States is the major culprit in the erosion of the Non-Proliferation Treaty, writes former US president Jimmy Carter.
Renewal talks for the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) are scheduled for May, yet the United States and other nuclear powers seem indifferent to its fate. This is remarkable, considering the addition of Iran and North Korea as states that either possess or seek nuclear weapons programmes. A recent United Nations report warned starkly: "We are approaching a point at which the erosion of the non-proliferation regime could become irreversible and result in a cascade of proliferation."
A group of "middle states" has a simple goal: "To exert leverage on the nuclear powers to take some minimum steps to save the non-proliferation treaty in 2005."Last year this coalition of nuclear-capable states - including Brazil, Egypt, Ireland, Mexico, New Zealand, South Africa, Sweden and eight Nato members - voted for a new agenda resolution calling for implementing NPT commitments already made. Tragically, the United States, Britain and France voted against this resolution.
So far the preparatory committee for the forthcoming NPT talks has failed even to achieve an agenda because of the deep divisions between nuclear powers that refuse to meet their own disarmament commitments and the non-nuclear movement, whose demands include honouring these pledges and considering the Israeli arsenal.
Until recently all American presidents since Dwight Eisenhower had striven to restrict and reduce nuclear arsenals, some more than others. So far as I know, there are no present efforts by any of the nuclear powers to accomplish these crucial goals.
The United States is the major culprit in this erosion of the NPT. While claiming to be protecting the world from proliferation threats in Iraq, Libya, Iran and North Korea, American leaders not only have abandoned existing treaty restraints but also have asserted plans to test and develop new weapons, including anti-ballistic missiles, the earth-penetrating "bunker buster" and perhaps some new "small" bombs. They also have abandoned past pledges and now threaten first use of nuclear weapons against non-nuclear states.
Some corrective actions are obvious:
This explanation has been given before, by India, Pakistan and North Korea, and has led to weapons programmes in all three states. Iran must be called to account and held to its promises under the NPT. At the same time, we fail to acknowledge how Israel's nuclear status entices Iran, Syria, Egypt and other states to join the community of nuclear weapons states.