LET’S LOOK SERIOUSLY AT A LIMITED NUCLEAR WEAPONS FREE ZONE FOR NORTHEAST ASIA

The world welcomed the latest news out of Pyongyang that it will rejoin the 6-Party Talks during the week of 25 July 2005.  The news came after a meeting between our new Assistant Secretary for East Asia and the Pacific, Chris Hill, and Democratic People’s Republic of Korea Vice Foreign Minister Kim Gye Gwan.  The U.S. in the last several months has obviously reversed course and is willing to talk to DPRK diplomatic representatives at the United Nations, tone down the rhetoric about the nature of that regime, and make arrangements necessary to get North Korea to the table. This is good news and is a strong indication that recent personnel changes at State have come with positive results.

In the three sessions the 6-Party Talks have had to date, they came to some very significant agreements. For example, all six agreed on four key points:

  1. A multilateral approach and a framework for multilateral dialogue would be followed;
  2. The Korean Peninsula should be a Nuclear Free Zone;
  3. An inspection system to ensure ultimate compliance with the final agreement is necessary; and
  4. There is a need for an institutionalized regional security forum once the immediate nuclear crisis is solved.

While the 6-Party Talks have made essential progress, another forum, in operation since 1992, but unofficial, has added one further element that would bind the region together in a cooperative security venture: a Limited Nuclear Weapons Free Zone for Northeast Asia.

In Track II or unofficial meetings between retired ambassadors, generals, admirals, scholars, business executives and peace activists, a group of dedicated individuals hammered out the elements of a new kind of nuclear free zone.  One that isn’t a “pure” nuclear free zone, as required by the U.S., but one that would be a start in a process of denuclearization and  one that would accept starts and not expect ultimate conclusions at the beginning.  It would be a “limited” nuclear weapons free zone – thus, only certain kinds of weapons would become part of the control regime, and not all the territory of the nuclear weapons states involved would be included.  In this way, the states pledging not to have nuclear weapons (Japan, North and South Korea, Mongolia, and Taiwan) would form a League of Non-Nuclear States, and the nuclear weapon states (China, Russia, and the U.S.) would provide a good faith “buy in” that would be  a percentage of their existing tactical nuclear weapons, and complete the membership for the regional zone.

Of course, the specifics of this group’s efforts have involved many official observers from all the nations involved, and our effort involves full members from China, Japan, South Korea, Mongolia, Russia, and the United States, plus active observers from Argentina, Canada, Finland and France.  Over the years since 1992, we have had meetings in Washington, Atlanta, Buenos Aires, Bordeaux, Moscow, Helsinki, Beijing, Tokyo, Seoul, Ulaan Baatar, Shanghai, Vancouver and Jeju-do, South Korea.  And at each meeting something new is added. The arguments and confrontations have become agreements and conciliation. The group, while ever changing in makeup, has become a force for productive and innovative ideas for cooperative security.

The Group has adopted a “Three Basket System” like the Helsinki Process that began in 1976. Basket One relates to details of the zone itself; Basket Two to the Confidence Building Items necessary to improve the environment of the region; and Basket Three focuses on those measures that might bring the DPRK into active participation.

Have we completed our work? No way!  But we have done enough to convince all the participants that the 6-Party Talks should look closely at the idea of a limited nuclear weapons-free zone in the region.  We believe that we have a new model that can contribute to an Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) System for the 21st Century, one that uses the presence of nuclear weapons as a means to develop trust where none exists and security cooperation where confrontation is the legacy of the past.

It is on Northeast Asia that we need to focus now, but South Asia and the Middle East could also benefit from our experience.  Good news on the non-proliferation front is needed after the May NPT disaster in New York.  A Limited Nuclear-Free Zone for Northeast Asia would be the kind of good news a battered world could use. The six nation negotiators should take a closer look at the progress made toward a limited nuclear free zone in the region.  (See full details on the project at www.cistp.gatech.edu.)

Tags: , , , , , , ,