Syrian Chemical Weapons to Lebanon: How Likely?
Posted: February 16, 2013 Filed under: Chemical, Terrorism 8 CommentsWhen Israel struck targets in Syria on 30 January, global attention turned to the possibility that the Assad regime might have decided on transferring weapon systems to one of its staunchest backers, the Hizbollah in Lebanon. A prime motivation, so some of the speculation goes, is the Syrian desire to avoid sophisticated weaponry from falling into the hands of insurgents. The column hit by Israeli planes reportedly transported anti-aircraft missiles, a weapon system the Syrian army hardly has any use for at present, but which could threaten its aerial monopoly in rebel hands. Syrian sources claimed that Israel also hit a military research facility, presumably involved in chemical and biological weapon (CBW) development. Unless there were several Israeli raids, the claim must amount to the Middle Eastern equivalent of the magic bullet theory in President John F. Kennedy’s murder investigation. Weapons transfers and a presumed CBW facility: the question whether the Syrians are passing on their chemical weapon (CW) holdings to Hizbollah cannot linger far behind.
Chemical incapacitants: an acute case of fragmentation of international law?
Posted: February 11, 2013 Filed under: Biological, Chemical 2 CommentsDavid Fidler raised an important point in discussing the ‘slippery slope ambiguity’ concerning the potential use of novel toxic chemicals for law enforcement purposes and lack of consensus among states to make a prohibition on such a development as comprehensive as possible.
There is a confluence of different types of discussion in the in the debate on incapacitating agents. The licitness of incapacitating agents falls between three specialised areas of law, namely:
Toxic Chemicals as Law Enforcement Weapons: New ICRC Policy Position for the CWC Review Conference in April 2013
Posted: February 6, 2013 Filed under: Chemical 1 CommentOn February 6, 2013, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) issued a News Release (http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/news-release/2013/02-06-toxic-chemicals-weapons.htm) and a Policy Position (http://www.icrc.org/eng/resources/documents/legal-fact-sheet/2013-02-06-toxic-chemicals-weapons-law-enforcement.htm) on the issue of law enforcement use of toxic chemicals (e.g., chemical incapacitating agents) as weapons. These documents continue the ICRC’s effort to have the states parties to the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) address the CWC’s provision on law enforcement use of toxic chemicals (Article II.9(d)). In September 2012, I posted some thoughts for this blog on an earlier ICRC document on law enforcement use of incapacitating chemical agents, a document that informed the policy position the ICRC announced on February 6.
Consistent with its earlier legal analysis, the new ICRC policy document argues in terms of the CWC and other relevant bodies of international law as follows:
From a legal perspective the ICRC wishes to recall that in armed conflict there is an absolute prohibition on the use of toxic chemicals as weapons under the 1925 Geneva Protocol, the Chemical Weapons Convention, and customary international humanitarian law. This includes a prohibition on the use of riot control agents as a method of warfare. The use of biological agents and toxins as weapons is absolutely prohibited by the Geneva Protocol, the 1972 Biological Weapons Convention and customary international humanitarian law.
Outside armed conflict, the Chemical Weapons Convention, the Biological Weapons Convention, international human rights law, and international drug control law form an overlapping legal framework regulating the use of toxic chemicals as weapons for law enforcement. It is the ICRC’s current assessment that this legal framework leaves little room, if any, for the legitimate use of toxic chemicals as weapons for law enforcement other than the use of riot control agents, as defined in the Chemical Weapons Convention.
Despite the conclusion that the CWC, combined with other international legal rules, drastically restricts, if not eliminates, legitimate law enforcement uses of toxic chemicals as weapons, the ICRC argues that:
The development and use of other toxic chemicals as weapons–such as the highly potent anaesthetic and sedative drugs considered in recent years as so called “incapacitating chemical agents”–presents serious risks to life and health, risks undermining international law prohibiting chemical weapons, and risks creating a ‘slippery slope’ towards the reintroduction of chemical weapons into armed conflict. The ICRC believes that these risks far outweigh any perceived operational benefits.
Thus, the ICRC advocates that CWC states parties, individually and collectively at the CWC review conference in April 2013 and other diplomatic forums, work to restrict law enforcement use of toxic chemicals exclusively to riot control agents (e.g., tear gas), as defined in the CWC.
In terms of international legal analysis, I agree with the ICRC that international law significantly restricts legitimate law enforcement uses of incapacitating chemicals. In the International Review of the Red Cross (2005) (http://www.icrc.org/eng/assets/files/other/irrc_859_fidler.pdf), I argued that, when read in conjunction with relevant rules of international law (e.g., human rights), a CWC state party’s ability to use incapacitating chemical agents for law enforcement purposes under Article II.9(d) of the CWC is very limited. I might quibble with the ICRC’s reading of international drug control treaties in its analysis, but such quibbles do not change my belief that the ICRC’s legal conclusion on this issue is correct.
However, I start to have problems with the “slippery slope” part of the ICRC’s analysis. My September 2012 post on the earlier ICRC document raised issues that, I think, still exist with respect to the ICRC’s policy position it just announced:
The problem is that the [ICRC’s] two messages–one arguing that no legal ambiguity really exists, the other asserting that dangerous legal ambiguity is present–do not seem consistent. On the one hand, the ICRC’s analysis of the CWC in light of other applicable international legal rules attempts to demonstrate that use of incapacitating chemical weapons for law enforcement purposes has virtually no legitimacy. In other words, we don’t really have legal ambiguity here when we look across all bodies of international law relevant to the CWC’s law enforcement provision. On the other hand, the ICRC warns about the “slippery slope” the ambiguity of the law enforcement provision creates that could lead to the destruction of the CWC’s absolute prohibition on use of chemical weapons in armed conflict. Or, we really have legal ambiguity here that is potentially catastrophic.
I sense that the ICRC is presenting these two messages in order to hit a policy “sweet spot” with states–moving from the status quo to an explicit ban should be easy and non-controversial given existing international law and eliminates any “slippery slope” possibility, a win-win policy and legal option. But, my speculative conjecture is that the ICRC’s two legal messages might adversely affect the policy recommendations it is making to all states.
Policymakers could interpret the “no ambiguity” conclusion as meaning that new policy or legal actions are not needed at national or international levels. If, as the ICRC claims, international law severely restricts, if not eliminates, legitimate uses of toxic chemicals for law enforcement purposes, why spend time and scarce resources enacting new national laws and seeking more international legal action? The stronger international law appears, the weaker the political incentive to take further policy action might be. Perhaps that’s why the ICRC raises the “slippery slope” legal argument to bolster political incentives to act.
But, the “slippery slope ambiguity” implies a lack of consensus among states about constraints on use of incapacitating chemical agents and a lack of commitment to multiple international legal regimes applicable to the issue. In this more troubling context, what confidence would policymakers have that one more international rule would solve the existential threat to the CWC’s fundamental purpose the ICRC fears? The “slippery slope ambiguity” argument makes international law appear like a house of cards that will completely collapse unless we add just one more card. Further, if enough ambiguity exists to make the “slippery slope” a real possibility, then achieving agreement internationally will be very difficult because ambiguity is apparently useful to a number of states. The weaker international law appears, the stronger the political incentive to preserve policy space might be.
Of course, speculative conjecture often turns out to be speculative conjecture unrelated to what actually unfolds. Going forward, three of the ICRC’s four recommendations target action at the national policy and legal level, with the strategy being to build a “bottom up” movement by concerned states that can, over time, translate into influence in relevant diplomatic contexts to produce, ultimately, an international prohibition on the use of toxic chemicals that are not riot control agents for law enforcement purposes. This strategy contrasts with unrequited hopes by concerned groups and individuals that CWC states parties would directly and effectively address this issue at previous review conferences in the first decade of this century. Whether the ICRC’s strategy for a “ground game” at the national level gains traction before the CWC review conference in April 2013 remains to be seen, but the ICRC, I would imagine, sees this strategy as an endeavor that will require more than a few months to make a difference.
Thank You, Senator Lugar. And Welcome, Professor Lugar
Posted: January 28, 2013 Filed under: Biological, Chemical, Missile, Nuclear 1 CommentWhen I was an undergraduate student years ago, I had the opportunity to have lunch with a U.S. senator from Indiana named Richard Lugar–someone about whom, I now cringe to admit, I did not know much at the time. The Cold War was still frigid, but the world was not far from momentous changes few saw coming. I remember clearly my reaction to Senator Lugar–here is someone who thinks deeply about U.S. interests and cares about American responsibilities beyond our shores.
In his long career in public service, Senator Lugar exhibited those traits in many contexts, but perhaps most famously in his work to prevent the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD). In the very early 1990s, with his colleague Sam Nunn, Senator Lugar created the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program (CTRP), widely known as the Nunn-Lugar program, which is hailed as one of the most significant U.S. national security policies of the post-Cold War period. The program was effective in not only achieving its initial objective of helping states emerging from the Soviet Union’s collapse keep nuclear weapons and related materials and capabilities from falling into dangerous hands but also expanding into chemical and biological weapons and beyond the former Soviet states. In December 2012, the U.S. government and the non-proliferation community celebrated the 20th anniversary of the CTRP.
This milestone asks us not only to reflect on the past but also to probe the future. Senators Nunn and Lugar know better than anyone that the CTRP has not made WMD proliferation a relic of another time and place. Indeed, the CTRP’s expansion beyond nuclear issues illustrates both the dangerous legacy of chemical weapon arsenals and the difficult task of managing “dual use” knowledge and capabilities in the biological realm. Further, the CTRP approach is predicated on mutual political commitment to cooperation, a prerequisite not present in important contexts of proliferation concern, such as Pakistan, Syria, North Korea, and Iran. Worries have arisen with Russia too given its declaration in the fall of 2012 that it would not renew its CTRP agreement with the United States in 2013 without changes to the arrangement–a disconcerting development given the scale and seriousness of the remaining WMD threat reduction agenda in Russia.
Problems with Russia and the inhospitable political conditions for cooperative threat reduction in other contexts of proliferation concern do not spell the “end of Nunn-Lugar.” However, we are entering a potentially challenging phase for this strategy that requires thinking hard about U.S. interests and caring about American responsibilities. Cooperative WMD threat reduction might become increasingly complicated for external and domestic reasons.
Externally, maintaining progress with CTRP efforts faces shifting national interests, characterized foremost by Russia’s re-evaluation of its arrangement with the United States. The risk of such shifts is not the sudden embrace of WMD proliferation; rather it is the danger of slackening focus on the urgency of threat reduction. In addition, cooperative threat reduction strategies might well find future crises that involve proliferation concerns extremely hard to affect. Just think of the proliferation fears that experts have about the collapse of the Assad regime in Syria, the implosion of the North Korean regime, or the potential cascade effect of Iranian development of nuclear weapons.
Domestically, commemorating two-decades of CTRP success should not underestimate looming political problems. Richard Lugar is no longer in the Senate, which raises questions about who will assume the burden of leadership he bore effectively on this issue for so many years. And leadership will be needed because the United States is facing wrenching choices at home and abroad as the moment of reckoning with its worsening fiscal crisis is upon the nation’s political institutions. Senator Lugar’s defeat in a primary election demonstrates the lack of traction his statesmanship on WMD proliferation had with voters–a cautionary tale for any politician operating in an extremely polarized country fixated on domestic issues and living well beyond its fiscal means.
In January 2013, my employer, Indiana University, named Richard Lugar a Distinguished Scholar and Professor of Practice in its new School of Global and International Studies. Professor Lugar (how strange that sounds) is donating his senatorial papers to Indiana University, a gift that will provide a treasure trove of resources for research on many issues, but especially his dedication to reducing the dangers of WMD proliferation. We still have much to learn . . .
Another speech, another omission – President Obama’s Inaugural Address
Posted: January 22, 2013 Filed under: Biological, Chemical, Conventional, Miscellaneous, Nuclear 6 CommentsI just read President Obama’s inaugural address and I was surprised to find no reference whatsoever to disarmament and non-proliferation, which played an important role in Obama’s first four years. I also found that declaring that ‘We [the US] will defend our people and uphold our values through strength of arms’ was a bit too belligerent (but, to be fair, he mentions the rule of law too). And what ‘decade of war’ is ending? I assume the reference is to the ‘war on terror’, an unfortunate expression that is obviously hard to get rid of.
What the UN Secretary-General said at the Monterey Institute of International Studies – And what he did not say
Posted: January 21, 2013 Filed under: Biological, Chemical, Conventional, Missile, Nuclear 3 CommentsOn 18 January, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon delivered a speech on the disarmament and non-proliferation agenda at the Monterey Institute of International Studies. While the Secretary-General highlighted five themes with regard to disarmament and non-proliferation (accountability, the rule of law, partnerships, the role of the UN Security Council, and education), it is what he did not say that I would like to draw your attention to.
Accountability. Ban Ki-moon stresses the special responsibility of the nuclear weapon states in contributing to nuclear disarmament and emphasises that ‘[n]uclear deterrence is not a solution to international peace and stability. It is an obstacle’. This might well be true but flies in the face of reality: the continued reliance of nuclear weapon states’ policies on nuclear deterrence. How those states can be persuaded to change their mind is something the Secretary-General does not address. He also recommends that negotiations are initiated in the Conference on Disarmament to secure legal security assurances for non-nuclear weapon states: while this would certainly be a welcome result at the universal level, it is often forgotten that those assurances are already provided in the protocols attached to the five treaties establishing nuclear weapon-free zones. What the Secretary-General could have also recommended is that the nuclear weapon states that have not done so ratify those protocols as soon as possible.
Rule of law. The Secretary-General maintains that the use of chemical weapons by the Syrian government would be ‘an outrageous crime with dire consequences’. While this is an obvious statement, it would have been interesting if the Secretary-General had expanded on the remedies should such a crime be committed: in particular, does he support the responsibility to protect doctrine to the point of allowing the unilateral use of force by states in reaction to international crimes? (see my previous post on this topic here)
Specific regional issues and the role of the Security Council. Ban Ki-moon singles out the usual suspects, i.e. Iran and North Korea, as his proliferation concerns. He admits that he is deeply concerned about Iran’s nuclear programme and stresses that Iran must comply with relevant Security Council resolutions. It is striking that there is no mention of other proliferators, i.e. India, Pakistan and Israel. True, they are not parties to the NPT and therefore have not violated it, but at the beginning of his speech the Secretary-General had emphatically stated that ‘[t]here are no right hands for wrong weapons’. On the upside, it is welcome to read that the Secretary-General believes that a conference on a zone free of weapons of mass destruction in the Middle East can still be convened in 2013 and that he supports the initiative (more information on the WMDFZ in the Middle East here and here). The Secretary-General does not, however, suggest steps to be taken in order to remove the obstacles that derailed the conference in 2012, in particular Israel’s opposition to the initiative.
Disarmament education. Ban Ki-moon rightly emphasises that funding for disarmament education, training and research is low. The Secretary-General also encourages the academia to include disarmament and non-proliferation issues in their curricula and research agendas. While the contributors to this blog cannot be blamed for not doing their part by researching and publishing on non-proliferation issues, undergraduate or postgraduate courses on non-proliferation law are still rare in universities. Consistently with existing financial resources, this is something that we academics with a non-proliferation expertise perhaps could do more on. If anyone is aware of or teaches university courses on non-proliferation law, why not drop us a line so that we can alert potentially interested students here.
Incapacitating Chemicals and the Chemical Weapons Convention: Reflections on the ICRC’s Perspectives on International Law and Toxic Chemicals as Weapons for Law Enforcement
Posted: September 6, 2012 Filed under: Chemical Leave a commentThe International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) recently circulated a six-page synthesis and two-page summary of the ICRC’s work on the threat it perceives that incapacitating chemicals used by law enforcement pose to the absolute prohibition on the use of chemical weapons in armed conflict contained in the Chemical Weapon Convention (CWC) [see ICRC, Toxic Chemicals as Weapons for Law Enforcement: A Threat to Life and International Law?: Synthesis (Sept. 2012); and ICRC, Toxic Chemicals as Weapons for Law Enforcement: A Threat to Life and International Law?: Summary (Sept. 2012)]. These documents are informed by ICRC activities on incapacitating chemical weapons, the CWC, and international law, including meetings with a broad range of participants held in March 2010 and April 2012. The ICRC intends the synthesis and summary to inform policy makers and civil society about this issue in the lead-up to the CWC review conference in April 2013.
The ICRC identifies the main problem in this area as the ambiguity that exists in the CWC provision that permits the use of toxic chemicals for law enforcement purposes, including domestic riot control (CWC, Article II:9(d)). This provision does not, in the ICRC’s words, specify “which toxic chemicals may be used as weapons for law enforcement and which ‘types and quantities’ are consistent with these purposes” (Synthesis, p. 2). The ICRC observes that different interpretations of this provision have been offered without CWC states parties acting to clarify the meaning despite opportunities to do so at the last two CWC review conferences.
However, the ICRC observes that other international legal regimes, namely international human rights law and international drug control treaties (1961 Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs and 1971 Convention on Psychotropic Substances), significantly, if not entirely, reduce the scope of legitimate law enforcement use of incapacitating chemicals as weapons. The ICRC observes that “it is extremely difficult, if not impossible” to use incapacitating chemicals for law enforcement purposes in ways consistent with human rights principles. It concludes that the international drug control treaties leave “little room, if any, for the legitimate use of toxic chemicals–other than riot control agents–as weapons for law enforcement of international law” (Synthesis, p. 3).
Informing these interpretations of international human rights law and international drug control treaties is scientific and medical input on the serious risks to human life and health associated with use of incapacitating chemicals as weapons for law enforcement purposes. In law enforcement situations, the police or security forces cannot control the dose of the chemicals to which persons are exposed, determine the conditions of exposure to the chemicals, or provide the urgent medical attention victims of exposure need. The scientific and medical input reinforces the legal interpretation that other areas of international law applicable to law enforcement use of weapons leave little to no ambiguity about the illegitimacy of law enforcement use of toxic chemicals beyond riot control agents.
The impact of these bodies of international law and the medical/scientific input suggests that the CWC’s law enforcement provision is not as ambiguous or dangerous as perhaps feared–meaning that CWC states parties could simply ratify this reality at the April 2013 review conference without much controversy. Here, we see the ICRC attempting to show CWC states parties how easy it is to accept the significant restrictiveness of the CWC’s law enforcement provision under a comprehensive international legal interpretation of it.
But, at the same time, the ICRC remains very concerned about ambiguity in the CWC’s law enforcement provision creating a risk that governments will exploit it to develop and use chemical weapons in armed conflict, leading to “a ‘slippery slope’ back to chemical warfare” (Synthesis, p. 5). Here, the ICRC uses fear of the consequences of legal ambiguity to motivate CWC states parties to take urgent action to prevent the “slippery slope” from emerging.
The problem is that the two messages–one arguing that no legal ambiguity really exists, the other asserting that dangerous legal ambiguity is present–do not seem consistent. On the one hand, the ICRC’s analysis of the CWC in light of other applicable international legal rules attempts to demonstrate that use of incapacitating chemical weapons for law enforcement purposes has virtually no legitimacy. In other words, we don’t really have legal ambiguity here when we look across all bodies of international law relevant to the CWC’s law enforcement provision. On the other hand, the ICRC warns about the “slippery slope” the ambiguity of the law enforcement provision creates that could lead to the destruction of the CWC’s absolute prohibition on use of chemical weapons in armed conflict. Or, we really have legal ambiguity here that is potentially catastrophic.
The ICRC’s position would make more sense if it argued that the layers of international law already in place seriously restrict, if not eliminate, the scope of law enforcement use of incapacitating chemicals, meaning that getting from law enforcement scenarios to use of chemical weapons in armed conflict would have to involve blatant and wholesale violations of multiple bodies of international law. This scenario is less a “slippery slope” than a nightmare involving clear and comprehensive violations by states of many international legal rules, including the CWC, international human rights law, international drug control treaties, and international humanitarian law.
Or, consistency would be achieved if the ICRC argued that the other relevant bodies of international law (as informed by medical and scientific input) do not resolve the ambiguity surrounding law enforcement use of incapacitating chemicals. Here, legal ambiguity would exist in not only the CWC’s law enforcement provision but also the other applicable international legal rules–and this aggregate ambiguity creates the “slippery slope” that CWC states parties need to address directly and urgently at the next review conference. However, the ICRC’s documents do not identify any such ambiguity in interpreting the CWC, international human rights law, and international drug control treaties that would support a dangerous “slippery slope” scenario threatening the very purpose of the CWC.
Ironically, the ICRC’s approach might provide CWC states parties two ways to avoid addressing its concerns about law enforcement uses of incapacitating chemical weapons. First, CWC states parties could assert that the CWC, combined with other international legal rules, sufficiently limits the scope of law enforcement use of incapacitating chemicals that no additional action is needed at a review conference. Second, CWC states parties could acknowledge continuing legal ambiguity on this question but politically prefer ambiguity to clarity–as has already happened at the past two review conferences.
At any rate, CWC states parties are unlikely to be impressed by the ICRC arguing simultaneously that international law virtually eliminates legitimate law enforcement uses of incapacitating chemical weapons and contains legal ambiguity on this issue on a scale that threatens to destroy the CWC and drag other relevant areas of international law into disrepute.
Is military intervention justified if Syria uses chemical weapons? Je ne crois pas…
Posted: August 28, 2012 Filed under: Chemical | Tags: chemical weapons, R2P, Syria, UN Charter 4 CommentsI read in the press that, according to French President François Hollande, the use of chemical weapons by Syria would be ‘a legitimate justification for military intervention’. Am I missing something here? The only case where the use of WMDs (or any other weapon) would legitimate an intervention against Syria would be if Syria would be using them against the interveners, who could then invoke self-defence. Or if the Security Council adopts a resolution under Chapter VII of the UN Charter authorising a military intervention in reaction to the use of WMDs by Syria against its own population (perhaps this is the situation Hollande had in mind). After all, according to para. 139 of the 2005 World Summit Outcome Document, states are prepared to exercise their responsibility to protect populations from their own governments only ‘through the Security Council, in accordance with the Charter, including Chapter VII’, and not unilaterally.
The use of chemical weapons, and of WMDs in general, is a violation of jus in bello, and not, per se, of jus ad bellum, which does not differentiate between types of weapons. Unless, of course, one argues that Hollande’s statement, which follows similar statements by the UK and the US, is a manifestation of a new opinio juris of the international community which might eventually lead to the formation of a further exception to the prohibition of the use of force under customary international law. But, in my opinion, this conclusion seems still unjustified.
The proposed WMD-free zone in the Middle East – Part One: law of the sea issues
Posted: July 6, 2012 Filed under: Biological, Chemical, Nuclear | Tags: Middle East, nuclear weapons, WMD 2 CommentsThis is the first of a series of posts on the proposed zone free of weapons of mass destruction (WMD) in the Middle East. Each post will focus on specific international law issues arising from the establishment of such zone. The present one deals with the international law of the sea.
Article VII of the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons recognizes the right ‘of any group of States to conclude regional treaties in order to assure the total absence of nuclear weapons in their respective territories’. UN General Assembly Resolution 3472 (XXX) B of 11 December 1975 defines a nuclear weapon-free zone (NWFZ) as ‘any zone, recognized as such by the General Assembly of the United Nations, which any group of States in the free exercise of their sovereignty, has established by virtue of a treaty or convention whereby: (a) the statute of total absence of nuclear weapons to which the zone shall be subject, including the procedure for the delimitation of the zone, is defined; (b) an international system of verification and control is established to guarantee compliance with the obligations deriving from that statute’. The two fundamental prohibitions for the states parties to a NWFZ treaty are the prohibition to possess nuclear explosive devices anywhere and the prohibition to station or allow the stationing of those devices (whoever owns them) within the zone. Five NWFZs have been established so far: in Latin America and the Caribbean (Treaty of Tlatelolco, 1967), in the South Pacific Ocean (Rarotonga Treaty, 1985), in South-East Asia (Bangkok Treaty, 1995), in Africa (Pelindaba Treaty, 1996) and in Central Asia (Semipalatinsk Treaty, 2006). All these treaties have now entered into force. Mongolia has also unilaterally declared itself nuclear weapon-free and Antarctica is denuclearized as a consequence of the 1959 Washington Treaty that demilitarized the continent and reserved it for exclusively peaceful purposes.
A NWFZ in the Middle East was first proposed by the Shah of Persia in 1974 with the endorsement of the Egyptian government. In 1990, Egypt proposed to broaden the scope of the zone and to turn it into a WMD-free zone so to target not only Israel’s nuclear programme but also the chemical and bacteriological weapons possessed by other Middle Eastern states. Since the 1980s, the UN General Assembly has annually adopted a resolution by consensus supporting the initiative. The WMD-free zone was also mentioned, among others, in Security Council Resolutions 687 (1991) on Iraq. Negotiations have however stalled for a long time but have gained momentum when, at the 1995 Review Conference of the NPT, the so-called Middle East Resolution was adopted as part of the package deal for the Arab States to agree to the indefinite extension of the NPT. The resolution, which was reaffirmed at the 2000 NPT Review Conference, endorsed the peace process in the Middle East, called the remaining countries not party to the NPT to accede as soon as possible and accept full scope IAEA safeguards, and called all Middle East states and NPT parties, in particular the nuclear weapon states, to make every effort to establish a WMD-free zone in the region. The subsequent 2010 NPT Review Conference finally called for a conference, to be held in 2012, in view of the establishment of such a zone. In October 2011, the UN Secretary-General announced that Finland had been chosen to host the conference with Jaakko Laajava, Under-Secretary of State in Finland’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, acting as the ‘facilitator’. It is still unclear whether it will be possible to hold the conference before the end of the year. In any case, the conference’s purpose is not to adopt a treaty, but to be a further step in the negotiation process that should hopefully lead to the drafting of the treaty.
Arms Control Law 