From the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region-led negotiation to the Intervention Brigade

The eastern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been characterised by chaos and insecurity for a number of years, but the rise of the M23 rebellion in 2012 once again highlighted just how dire the humanitarian and security situation is. For most of 2012, the crisis was addressed through negotiations between M23 and Kinshasa, mediated by the International Conference on the Great Lakes Region (ICGLR). However, 2013 marked the signing of the Peace, Security and Cooperation Framework Agreement (PSC Framework), and the United Nations Security Council's adoption of Resolution 2098, which contains the mandate of the long-awaited Intervention Brigade (IB). The PSC Framework calls on Kinshasa to implement substantial political reforms while also urging the neighbours of the DRC to stop interfering in its internal affairs. The IB is mandated to carry out targeted operations against the so-called ‘negative forces’ that operate in the eastern DRC. For now, hope of resolving this ongoing crisis hinges on the continuing ICGLR negotiations, the implementation of the PSC Framework and the success of the IB. However, there are critical questions about all of these processes that need to be answered and understood, as the expectations for these processes – especially in the case of the IB – are extremely high. Will the ICGLR manage to negotiate a peace agreement and will the IB succeed, or will they go down in history as yet another failure to save the eastern DRC?     

ACQUIRING FOREIGN NUCLEAR ASSISTANCE IN THE MIDDLE EAST

The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has laid out an ambitious plan to become the first Arab country to possess a civilian nuclear energy program. Central to that effort has been the Emirati government's ability to obtain foreign nuclear assistance. This article traces the UAE's strategies for overcoming the obstacles that stood in the way of nuclear suppliers providing assistance. It examines the approach taken by the UAE to assuage the safety and security concerns of nuclear suppliers, how the UAE leveraged its alliances with France and the United States to obtain their cooperation, and its strategies for engaging domestic interest groups in supplier states. The generalizable elements of the UAE's strategies are discussed and used to provide insight into the prospects for other Middle Eastern states' bids to obtain similar assistance. The article concludes with a discussion of the potentially transformative aspects of the strategies employed by the UAE in shaping other countries' pursuit of nuclear energy in the region.     

TURKEY'S NUCLEAR COMEBACK

As worries have grown about global warming and the sustainability and price of fossil fuels, the demand for nuclear energy has increased, and nuclear power is increasingly viewed as a reliable and clean resource. However, the so-called nuclear renaissance coincides with an international security environment in which the norms of nuclear nonproliferation seem to be eroding. Turkey, a non-nuclear weapon state, plans to generate nuclear power to meet future energy demands, but it is aware of and concerned with regional proliferation trends. Questions have also been raised regarding Ankara's rationale for using nuclear energy, as well as its potential motivations and capabilities regarding future proliferation. This article will provide an overview of Turkey's nuclear energy history and plans, as well as the proliferation-related questions that could arise; it will also look at the domestic debate on nuclear energy and Turkey's status as a non-nuclear weapon state.     

Deferred verification: verifiable declarations of fissile-material stocks for disarmament purposes

ABSTRACT

Nuclear disarmament is often seen as eventually requiring access to nuclear warheads or to the warhead-dismantlement process to verify that a state has not hidden weapons or weapon-materials despite promising to disarm. This article suggests this view is misplaced, and that what is needed is a verification mechanism able to provide reliable assurances of the absence of fissile materials available for use in weapons after a state has disarmed. Such a mechanism will need an initial declaration of the amount of fissile materials held by a state for all purposes, military and civilian. In a state with a nuclear arsenal awaiting elimination, this declaration would have to include materials that may not be available for verification because they are in nuclear weapons or are in other classified or proliferation-sensitive forms. This article describes a verification arrangement that does not require access to materials in weapons and in sensitive forms while still allowing checks on the overall accuracy of the declaration. Verification of the completeness and correctness of the declaration is deferred to the time when the weapons-relevant material enters the disposition process, at which point it no longer has any sensitive attributes. By removing the focus on monitoring warheads and dismantlement, this new approach could provide a more manageable path to nuclear disarmament.     

The Power of the NPT: International Norms and Ukraine's Nuclear Disarmament

ABSTRACT

There is a lingering disagreement among scholars on how the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) affects nonproliferation and disarmament outcomes. Drawing on constructivist scholarship on international norms, this article examines the extent of the NPT's effect in the case of Ukraine's nuclear disarmament. In the wake of the Soviet Union's collapse, Ukraine found itself host to the world's third largest nuclear arsenal. Despite Ukraine's initial commitment to become a non-nuclear state, it proceeded along a difficult path toward NPT accession. Most controversial and directly at odds with the NPT was Ukraine's claim to ownership of its nuclear inheritance as a successor state of the Soviet Union. This article argues that, while much domestic discourse about the fate of these nuclear weapons was embedded in the negotiation of Ukraine's new identity as a sovereign state vis-à-vis Russia and the West, the NPT played an important, structural role by outlining a separate normative space for nuclear weapons and providing the grammar of denuclearization with which Ukraine's decision makers had to grapple.     

NONPROLIFERATION POLICY CROSSROADS:

On October 1, 2008, Congress enacted a proposal that originated with President George W. Bush in 2005 to approve an unprecedented nuclear trade pact with India by removing a central pillar of US nonproliferation policy. Despite the numerous political challenges confronting the Bush administration, the initiative won strong bipartisan support, including votes from Democratic Senators Joseph Biden, Hillary Clinton, and Barack Obama. The four-year struggle to pass the controversial US-India nuclear trade agreement offers an exceptionally valuable case study. It demonstrates a classic tradeoff between the pursuit of broad multilateral goals such as nuclear nonproliferation and advancement of a specific bilateral relationship. It reveals enduring fault lines in executive branch relations with Congress. It vividly portrays challenges confronting proponents of a strong nonproliferation regime. This article is based on an analysis of the negotiating record and congressional deliberations, including interviews with key participants. It assesses the lessons learned and focuses on three principal questions: how did the agreement seek to advance US national security interests?; what were the essential elements of the prolonged state-of-the-art lobbying campaign to win approval from skeptics in Congress?; and what are the agreement's actual benefits—and costs—to future US nonproliferation efforts?     

The Problem of Weak Nuclear States

Governments are increasingly recognizing the problem posed by internally weak nuclear-capable states. The problem, however, is under-theorized. This article brings together literature on sovereignty and international order, the nonproliferation regime, and weak states, and introduces new concepts to provide a more structured understanding of this problem. Insight comes from focusing attention on the function and governance of two nuclear estates (termed the production and operational estates), and on their resilience to decay and disorder occurring within the state and society. Drawing on empirical observation, the authors suggest a typology of weakness in nuclear states, involving state fragmentation typified by the former Soviet Union, the “hard weak state” typified by North Korea, and the internally conflicted state typified by Pakistan. Although these types give rise to distinctive difficulties, their alleviation depends heavily on the maintenance of internal authority within the state and estates, the presence or absence of cooperative relations, and the international regulatory framework's vitality.     

The Importance of Safeguards Culture

International safeguards is the system of measures put in place by the International Atomic Energy Agency and states to ensure nuclear programs remain dedicated to peaceful purposes. This international safeguards system consists of agreements, inspections, and evaluations that have never considered the safeguards culture of a state or facility. Neither a common definition nor an understanding of safeguards culture is internationally recognized. This article provides an analysis of the concept of safeguards culture and gauges its value to the international safeguards community. The authors explore distinctions among safeguards culture, safeguards compliance, and safeguards performance, and suggest possible indicators of safeguards culture and methods to promote a strong, positive safeguards culture.     

RELIABLE ENERGY SUPPLY AND NONPROLIFERATION

The phenomenon of global warming has led to a revival of the prospects for increased nuclear energy production worldwide, yet such increased production carries with it the increased risk of proliferation. To mitigate this risk, various multinational arrangements have been proposed to provide reliable supply of nuclear fuel while at the same time discouraging the construction of national plants for nuclear enrichment and reprocessing. This article provides a brief history of some of these proposals and concludes that the likelihood of success for such schemes as effective tools for nonproliferation is not high at this time. A proposal from the World Council on Renewable Energy to expand the understanding of supplier obligations under Article IV of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) to include the development of non-nuclear energy technologies for NPT parties in good standing is potentially a much better nonproliferation tool. Such an approach tracks the ideas contained in Title V of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Act of 1978, which has recently received revived congressional interest.     

SAVING THE NPT

For more than forty years, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) has provided major security benefits to the international community; however, the treaty is suffering from internal and external pressures, and benign neglect on the part of its members is undermining its authority. To ensure the treaty's continued viability, it is time for member states to start showing the NPT the respect it deserves and to renew their commitments to its fundamental purposes. Achieving this requires remedial action in at least four areas of vulnerability: reinvigorating nuclear disarmament; strengthening nonproliferation; overcoming the NPT's institutional deficit; and fostering a rapprochement between NPT and non-NPT states that does not abandon the goal of treaty universalization. There is still time before the 2010 NPT Review Conference for concerted action to restore the NPT's vitality and for the United States to resume its leadership role on behalf of the treaty and its membership.