The In-Comprehensive Test Ban

Abstract

The author examines why the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban (CTB) treaty might not make it through the political minefields. Negotiators at the 60-nation U.N. The conference on Disarmament in Geneva reached an impasse, prompted by India`s assertions that the treaty was an inadequate document that perpetuated {open_quotes}nuclear apartheid{close_quotes} while violating India`s sovereignty. Because the Conference on Disarmament-often called the {open_quotes}Geneva Conference{close_quotes} or the {open_quotes}CD{close_quotes}-operates by consensus, India was able to veto the adoption of the treaty, which the conference had planned to transmit to the United Nations in early September. Australia saved the treaty with a last minute decision to bypass the Geneva Conference and take the CTB directly to the General Assembly in the form of a resolution. Some 127 nations co-sponsored Australia`s resolution, to which the treaty draft was attached. The General Assembly endorsed the treaty by a vote of 158 to three. India, Bhutan, and Libya voted against it. Despite the overwhelming vote, the treaty`s long-range outlook is uncertain. On the day of the vote, India`s chief test-ban negotiator, declared that India would {open_quotes}never sign this unequal treaty because Article XIV of the treaty, which requires that all 44 nuclear-capable nations who also belong to the Conferencemore » on Disarmament must sign and ratify the treaty. That requirement was viewed as contrary to international law because it denied India`s right of voluntary consent to an international treaty, thus violating India`s sovereignty.« less