NPT/CONF.2005/PC.I/11

Original: English
First session
New York, 8-19 April 2002

Implementation of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of
Nuclear Weapons

Canada has recently called upon nuclear-weapon States not to provide assistance or encouragement to States who may seek to acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices.

Canada continues to abide by its NPT commitment not to receive the transfer of, receive control over, manufacture or acquire nuclear weapons or a nuclear explosive capability.

Pursuant to Article III, Canada has in place a safeguards agreement with IAEA for the application of safeguards in connection with NPT. The IAEA has provided annually a positive assessment of safeguards implementation in Canada pursuant to this agreement. In support of IAEA efforts to strengthen safeguards and recognizing the "symbiotic relationship" between NPT safeguards agreements and the model Additional Protocol to those agreements, Canada concluded a Protocol additional to its safeguards agreement. The Protocol entered into force on 8 September 2000. The Agency is currently reviewing Canada's initial declaration under the Protocol. Canada continues to urge States which have yet to bring into force comprehensive safeguards agreements to do so and continues to call upon States to bring into force protocols additional to their safeguards agreements. In that regard, in 2001, Canada participated actively in the International Symposium on the Further Reinforcement of IAEA Safeguards in the Asia Pacific Region in Tokyo, the IAEA Symposium on International Safeguards in Vienna and the Regional Seminar on the Protocol Additional to Nuclear Safeguards Agreements in Lima.

Consonant with its obligation not to provide source or special fissionable material, or equipment or material especially designed or prepared for the processing, use or production of special fissionable material to any non-nuclear-weapon for peaceful purposes unless the source or special fissionable material is subject to IAEA safeguards, and with Decision 2, Paragraph 12 of the 1995 NPT Review and Extension Conference, Canada requires, inter alia, that nuclear cooperation will only be authorized with those non-nuclear-weapon States which have made an internationally legally-binding commitment not to acquire nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices and have accepted IAEA safeguards on the full scope of their nuclear activities. This policy has been in place since 1976. With a view to effectively implementing the requirements of paragraph 2 of this Article, Canada maintains a national system for controlling, inter alia, the export of source or special fissionable material and equipment or material especially prepared for the processing, use or production of special fissionable material. This system also reflects multilaterally agreed lists of nuclear items and nuclear-related dual-use items. All these measures serve to facilitate Canada's peaceful nuclear commerce and international cooperation.

Canada continues to support strongly the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. In this regard, Canada maintains a robust nuclear power programme and uranium industry and is a world leader in the production of radioisotopes for medical and industrial applications. Canada has Nuclear Cooperation Agreements in force covering 37 countries, both developed and developing, to provide a framework for the fullest possible exchange of nuclear and other material, equipment and technology. At each Review Conference, Canada circulates information detailing its activities conducted pursuant to Article IV; this will also be done at the 2005 Review Conference.

The Final Document of the 2000 Review Conference affirms that provisions of this article are to be interpreted in the light of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). Canada signed the CTBT on 24 September 1996 when it opened for signature and deposited its instrument of ratification 18 December 1998. Canada continues to encourage other States to ratify this Treaty, particularly the States listed in annex 2. In the months preceding the 11-13 November 2001 Entry into Force Conference of the CTBT, Canada's Foreign Minister wrote to his counterparts in the 13 States listed in annex 2 of the Treaty who had yet to ratify, urging their ratification. Canada actively participated in the Conference and participated in a related Seminar on the Verification of the CTBT organized by the NGO VERTIC. Canada continues to call on nuclear-weapon States that have not ratified the CTBT to continue their testing moratoria. Canada places a priority on the establishment of the Treaty's verification system and, as such, is a leader among Member States in contributing resources, equipment and expertise to the development of CTBT’s international monitoring system (IMS).

Canada's objective has been and remains the complete elimination of nuclear weapons. Canada expects the nuclear-weapon States to engage actively on this issue and to make further progress to reduce and to eliminate nuclear weapons. All members of the international community have a deep and abiding stake in this process. Both bilaterally and at the Conference on Disarmament (CD) Canada has welcomed the US-Russia reductions in strategic nuclear warheads announced in November 2001 and encouraged the two parties to codify these reductions in a legally binding, transparent, verifiable and irreversible fashion.

Canada believes that progress in reducing strategic nuclear weapons alone is not sufficient. fifty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly Canada noted the need to focus on tactical nuclear weapons as well.

Canada welcomes the reduced salience of nuclear weapons and the significant reduction of North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) forces, both conventional and nuclear, that has taken place since the end of the Cold War. Canada, as a member of NATO, continues to advocate that the Alliance play a positive role in advancing disarmament objectives, through a continuous step-by-step approach.

Canada believes that every State Party to the NPT has an interest and a responsibility to encourage the fulfilment of Article VI.

During the fifty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly, Canada tabled a resolution calling for negotiations within the CD on a Fissile Materials Cutoff Treaty (FMCT); this resolution was adopted by consensus. Pending conclusion of an FMCT, Canada has urged nuclear-weapon States to affirm or reaffirm, as the case may be, their commitment to forever cease production of fissile material for nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices. Addressing the CD in March 2002, Canada's Foreign Minister urged that body to take up the Amorim proposal (CD/1624) for a programme of work for the Conference on Disarmament which would include negotiation of an FMCT and dealing with the prevention of an arms race in outer space and with nuclear disarmament issues. Canada had promoted the adoption of this work programme as CD President during the period 22 January-18 February 2001.

Canada welcomed the bilateral agreement on plutonium disposition between the United States of America and the Russian Federation, signed in September 2000, in which each country undertakes to dispose of 34 metric tonnes of weapon-grade plutonium no longer required for defence purposes. This is a nuclear disarmament activity which, consonant with the obligations under this Article, will dispose of plutonium from thousands of nuclear weapons. In doing so, it will contribute significantly to international security. Canada. for its part, will continue to work with other States to implement this initiative.

In the interests of general and complete disarmament, Canada is also a State Party to the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty, the Biological and Toxin Weapons Convention, the Chemical Weapons Convention, the Ottawa Convention banning anti-personnel mines, the Treaty on Conventional Forces in Europe, Open Skies, the Treaty on Certain Conventional Weapons and the Treaty on Outer Space. Canada also participated actively in the United Nations Conference on Illicit Traffic in Small Arms and Light Weapons of July 2001. Canada has provided financial support to mine clearance and related activities in over 25 States, to small arms and light weapons disarmament, demobilization and reintegration, collection and destruction in Latin America and the Caribbean, Europe, Africa and Asia, and for chemical weapons destruction in the Russian Federation.

While not itself a member of a nuclear-weapon-free zone, Canada welcomes and encourages progress to develop and implement nuclear-weapon-free zone agreements consistent with international law and internationally-agreed criteria. At the fifty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly, Canada supported resolutions establishing or consolidating nuclear-weapon-free zones.

The NPT indefinite extension and accompanying decisions adopted in 1995 included a commitment to a Strengthened Treaty Review Process. In this regard, Canadian priorities for the NPT in both the short and the long term focus on enhancing the permanence and the accountability of the Treaty. In this spirit, Canada is hereby delivering its first report on implementation of all the articles of the NPT, and plans to deliver such reports annually. As no standard format has yet been agreed upon for such reports, Canada encourages States Parties to commence discussions with the aim of establishing one, which could become an outcome of the 2005 Review Conference.

At the fifty-sixth session of the United Nations General Assembly Canada called for those few remaining States not yet party to the Treaty to accede to it as non-nuclear-weapon States Parties and has repeated this call on different occasions, particularly to the three States — India, Israel, Pakistan — that operate unsafeguarded nuclear facilities. Canada condemned the nuclear tests conducted by India and Pakistan in May 1998, and has since issued formal expressions of regret over the ballistic missile tests carried out by India in January 2001 and 2002. Canada regards Indian and Pakistani nuclear proliferation, and their claims to be nuclear-weapon States as new and significant threats to international peace and security. Canada therefore supports Security Council resolution 1172 (1998) and its requirement that India and Pakistan renounce their nuclear weapons programmes. Canada recalls and supports fully the May 2000 Review Conference Final Document declaration that the Indian and Pakistani nuclear tests "do not in any way confer a nuclear-weapon State status or any special status whatsoever". In an effort to diminish tensions in South Asia and hence reduce the risk of the use of nuclear weapons, Canada has supported several initiatives aimed at fostering confidence-building measures in the region.

The Final Document of the 2000 Review Conference noted with concern that IAEA continued to be unable to verify the correctness and completeness of the initial declaration of nuclear material made by the Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK), and was therefore unable to conclude that there has been no diversion of nuclear material in that country. For a number of years, Canada has been an initial co-sponsor of a resolution at the L4EA General Conference on the implementation of the IAEA-DPRK safeguards resolution. In 2001 this resolution, GC(45)/RES/16, inter alia, urged DPRK to comply fully with its safeguards agreement, including all steps the agency deems necessary to preserve all information relevant to verifying the correctness and completeness of the DPRK's initial declaration. Canada has also used opportunities presented by the establishment of diplomatic relations to encourage DPRK to cooperate fully with IAEA in order that DPRK come into full compliance with its Treaty safeguards. Since 1995, Canada has contributed to regional stability through its membership to the Korean Peninsula Energy Development Organisation (KEDO) and its total financial contribution of $6.8 million.

Canada's efforts to combat nuclear proliferation in the Middle East are discussed elsewhere in the national report pursuant to the Middle East resolution.

Canada welcomed the 1995 indefinite extension of this Treaty, adopted in 1995 by 175 countries without a vote. Negative security assurances provided in 1995 by the five nuclear-weapon States Parties to the NPT, in United Nations Security Council resolution 984 (1995), furnished part of the basis for this indefinite extension, as paragraph 8 of the "Principles and Objectives for Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament". Canada has underlined the need to preserve and respect the negative security assurances provided by nuclear-weapon States to non-nuclear-weapon States Parties to this Treaty.

Article XI: N/A