Western states defeated an Iranian proposal at the UN nuclear agency’s annual assembly yesterday to amend their draft resolution on a policy area central to its work in preventing the spread of atom bombs.
The draft text was adopted in a vote shortly after midnight after days of closed-door negotiations failed to achieve the traditional consensus, with divisions between a small number of countries led by Iran and a much larger Western-dominated group.
Diplomats said Iran and Egypt had wanted to include language in the resolution suggesting the UN agency should have a role also in nuclear disarmament, apparently reflecting frustration on their part at the lack of faster progress on this issue.
This was opposed by a large majority including the US, Britain, France and Russia — four officially recognized nuclear weapon states — which believe the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) is not the right forum, they said.
The West accuses Iran of trying to develop a nuclear weapons capability in secret. The Islamic Republic denies the charge.
Tehran often hits out at the US over its atomic arsenal and also criticises Iran’s archfoe, Israel, and that country’s assumed nuclear weapons.
The annual General Conference of the 155 IAEA member states traditionally adopts several resolutions, setting out general and often vaguely worded policy aspirations and guidelines, during a week-long meeting in Vienna.
Like last year, the most contentious issue was a text regarding the IAEA’s activities in seeking to make sure nuclear material is not diverted for non-peaceful purposes, a crucial task for the UN agency under the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
Last year, the gathering failed to agree the resolution on “strengthening the effectiveness and improving the efficiency of the safeguards system” submitted by 30 Western states.
Safeguards refer to measures undertaken by UN inspectors to discover any attempt by non-nuclear weapons states to use atomic technology or material for developing weapons — for example regular visits and camera surveillance of sites.
This year, Iran said a paragraph saying IAEA “safeguards are a fundamental component of nuclear non-proliferation” should be amended to add “and nuclear disarmament.” This was rejected by 55 votes against and nine for. The resolution then passed by 89 for, no vote against and 16 abstentions, including Iran.
Several countries, including South Africa and Brazil, stressed their support for nuclear disarmament even though they voted against the Iranian proposal.
Under the NPT, a 1970 pact, the five recognized atomic bomb “haves” agreed to work toward eliminating their nuclear weapons, and the “have-nots” pledged not to pursue them.
Critics say there has been more emphasis on meeting the non-proliferation goal than getting the five major powers — the US, China, Russia, France and Britain — to fulfil their part of the deal.
In related developments, the IAEA passed a resolution by consensus on Friday that “strongly urged” North Korea to abandon its nuclear weapons program, underlining Pyongyang’s international isolation.
The text adopted without a vote by the agency also called on North Korea, which is not a member of the Vienna-based UN grouping, not to carry out a new nuclear test.
The IAEA conference “stresses its desire for a diplomatic resolution of the [North Korea] nuclear issue so as to achieve the complete, verifiable and irreversible denuclearization of the Korean peninsula,” it said.
It “reaffirms that [North Korea] cannot have the status of a nuclear-weapon state” under the NPT. North Korea meanwhile says it needs nuclear power to provide electricity, but has also boasted of its nuclear deterrence capability and has traded nuclear technology with Syria, Libya and probably Myanmar and Pakistan.
It was earlier this year believed to be pushing ahead with plans for a third nuclear test, after carrying out detonations in 2006 and 2009.
It became the first country to withdraw from the NPT in 2003 and has denied the IAEA access to its atomic sites, reneging on a February deal to do so after it announced plans to launch a long-range rocket, in defiance of UN Security Council resolutions.
US envoy Robert Wood said the IAEA resolution “sent a clear message that the international community continues to hold North Korea to its denuclearization obligations and commitments.”
“North Korea must immediately cease all nuclear activities,” Wood told the assembly. “North Korea must allow the IAEA to establish a long-term presence to monitor and verify the cessation and abandonment of these activities.”
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS