Success Of NPT Review Conference Great News

Disarmament Minister Georgina te Heuheu today welcomed the success of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, which completed its work in New York earlier today (NZ time) with the adoption of a comprehensive action plan.

“This is great news. The success of the NPT Review Conference represents an important step forward for the global nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation regime,” Mrs te Heuheu said.

“The international community has come together today and collectively decided that this critical Treaty, forty years old this year, still provides us with a path towards a nuclear-weapon-free world and the framework for preventing the spread of these weapons.

“While the outcome may not be as strong as New Zealand and others might have hoped, it is an outcome which takes us forward. It is a platform we can build on.

“I take special note of the statement today by the many members of the Non-Aligned Movement, which described it as a package that can move us forward together on all fronts.

“I am proud of New Zealand’s role in this. We worked in the New Agenda Coalition group of countries for the strongest possible outcome on nuclear disarmament. We led a cross regional group on reducing the operational status of nuclear weapons. We were part of a group that worked intensively on nuclear non-proliferation, and in the later stages of the Conference New Zealand was asked to help forge consensus on that issue.”

“When negotiations seemed to be faltering on Thursday I joined with Ministers from Australia, Austria, Germany, Japan and the Republic of Korea in an urgent call for unity by all participants to show flexibility so that this Conference could send a strong political signal to reinforce momentum towards a world without nuclear weapons.

“I think this signal has been sent.”

The NPT Review Conference is a five-yearly event, tasked to review the Treaty and decide on steps to strengthen it. The 64-point action plan adopted by the Conference today covers the three so-called pillars of the Treaty: nuclear disarmament, nuclear non-proliferation and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy. The plan also contains agreed steps towards the implementation of a nuclear-weapons-free zone in the Middle East.

The Conference noted the section of the final document which reviewed implementation of the Treaty over the past five years and which was tabled by the President of the Conference as a record of the discussions.

ENDS

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