[Congressional Record Volume 144, Number 7 (Thursday, February 5, 1998)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Pages E111-E112]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                      NEED FOR NUCLEAR DISARMAMENT

                                 ______
                                 

                         HON. RONALD V. DELLUMS

                             of california

                    in the house of representatives

                       Thursday, February 5, 1998

  Mr. DELLUMS. Mr. Speaker, on my last legislative day as a Member of 
Congress, I wish to share with my colleagues my concern that we are not 
moving forward deliberately enough to meet our obligations to secure 
the eradication of nuclear weapons--as is required under the Nuclear 
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).
  Preserving our planet for the future of our children is our moral 
obligation, and eradicating nuclear weapons stockpiles is a key to 
fulfilling that obligation. Former Generals of the United States armed 
forces have called for such a commitment. The International Court of 
Justice has opined on the obligation nations have to achieve this goal. 
The United Nations General Assembly has recently acted in this regard 
and circulating now is a draft convention on the elimination of such 
weapons.
  I urge our government to take the lead in changing its own policy and 
in advancing the cause of nuclear disarmament in the world. We should 
not be inventing new uses for these weapons of mass destruction, but 
should instead use all of the power of our imagination, diplomacy and 
statecraft to achieve this objective.
  In this light, Mr. Speaker, I want to share with my colleagues two 
documents that are part of the legal and moral fabric that surrounds 
this issue. The first is of the ``dispositif'' of the International 
Court of Justice which illuminates the legal obligations that face the 
nations of the world. The second is the General Assembly Resolution on 
this subject. I hope that my colleagues will familiarize themselves 
with the issues raised within these important documents.

                                                   United Nations,


                                             General Assembly.

       [Fifty-second session, First Committee Agenda item 71 (k)]


                    GENERAL AND COMPLETE DISARMAMENT

       Algeria, Bangladesh, Brazil, Brunei Darussalam, Burundi, 
     Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador, El Salvador, Fiji, Ghana, 
     Guyana, Honduras, India, Indonesia, Iran (Islamic Republic 
     of), Iraq, Jamaica, Kenya, Lao People's Democratic Republic, 
     Malawi, Malaysia, Marshall Islands, Mexico, Mongolia, 
     Myanmar, Namibia, Niger, Nigeria, Panama, Papua New Guinea, 
     Paraguay, Peru, Phillipines, Samoa, San Marino, Singapore, 
     Solomon Islands, Sri Lanka, Sudan, Thailand, United Republic 
     of Tanzania, Uruguay, Viet Nam and Zimbabwe: draft resolution
       Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice on 
     the Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear Weapons
       The General Assembly,
       Recalling its resolutions 49/75 K of 15 December 1994 and 
     51/45 M of 10 December 1996,
       Convinced that the continuing existence of nuclear weapons 
     poses a threat to all humanity and that their use would have 
     catastrophic consequences for all life on Earth, and 
     recognizing that the only defence against a nuclear 
     catastrophe is the total elimination of nuclear weapons and 
     the certainty that they will never be produced again,
       Mindful of the solemn obligations of States parties, 
     undertaken in article VI of the Treaty on the Non-
     Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,\1\ particularly to pursue 
     negotiations in good faith on effective measures relating to 
     cessation of the nuclear arms race at an early date and to 
     nuclear disarmament.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------
     \1\ Footnotes appear at end of article.
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       Recalling the Principles and Objectives for Nuclear Non-
     Proliferation and Disarmament adopted at the 1995 Review and 
     Extension Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on the Non-
     Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons,\2\ and in particular the 
     objective of determined pursuit by the nuclear-weapon States 
     of systematic and progressive efforts to reduce nuclear 
     weapons globally, with the ultimate goal of eliminating those 
     weapons,
       Recalling also the adoption of the Comprehensive Nuclear-
     Test-Ban Treaty in its resolution 50/245 of 10 September 
     1996,
       Recognizing with satisfaction that the Antarctic Treaty and 
     the treaties of Tlatelolco, Rarotonga, Bangkok and Pelindaba 
     are gradually freeing the entire southern hemisphere and 
     adjacent areas covered by those treaties from nuclear 
     weapons,
       Noting the efforts by the States possessing the largest 
     inventories of nuclear weapons to reduce their stockpiles of 
     such weapons through bilateral and unilateral agreements or 
     arrangements, and calling for the intensification of such 
     efforts to accelerate the significant reduction of nuclear-
     weapons arsenals,
       Recognizing the need for a multilaterally negotiated and 
     legally binding instrument to assure non-nuclear-weapon 
     States against the threat or use of nuclear weapons,
       Reaffirming the central role of the Conference on 
     Disarmament as the single multilateral disarmament 
     negotiating forum, and regretting the lack of progress in 
     disarmament negotiations, particularly nuclear disarmament, 
     in the Conference on Disarmament during its 1997 session,
       Emphasizing the need for the Conference on Disarmament to 
     commence negotiations on a phased programme for the complete 
     elimination of nuclear weapons with a specified framework of 
     time,
       Desiring to achieve the objective of a legally binding 
     prohibition of the development, production, testing, 
     deployment, stockpiling, threat or use of nuclear weapons and 
     their destruction under effective international control,
       Recalling the advisory opinion of the International Court 
     of Justice on the Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear 
     Weapons,\3\ issued on 8 July 1996,
       1. Underlines once again the unanimous conclusion of the 
     International Court of Justice that there exists an 
     obligation to pursue in good faith and bring to a conclusion 
     negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament in all its 
     aspects under strict and effective international control;
       2. Calls once again upon all States to immediately fulfill 
     that obligation by commencing multilateral negotiations in 
     1998 leading to an early conclusion of a nuclear-weapons 
     convention prohibiting the development, production, testing, 
     deployment, stockpiling, transfer, threat or use of nuclear 
     weapons and providing for their elimination;
       3. Requests all States to inform the Secretary-General of 
     the efforts and measures they have taken on the 
     implementation of the present resolution and nuclear 
     disarmament, and requests the Secretary-General to apprise 
     the General Assembly of that information at its fifty-third 
     session;
       4. Decides to include in the provisional agenda of its 
     fifty-third session an item entitled ``Follow-up to the 
     advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice on the 
     Legality of the Threat or Use of Nuclear Weapons.''


                               Footnotes

     * Reissued for technical reasons.
     \1\ United Nations, Treaty Series, vol. 729, No. 10485.
     \2\ 1995 Review and Extension Conference of the Parties to 
     the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, Final 
     Document, Part I (NPT/CONF.1995/32 (Part I)), annex, decision 
     2.
     \3\ A/51/218, annex.
                                  ____


 Appendix III--Dispositif of the Advisory Opinion of the International 
   Court of Justice on the legality of the threat or use of nuclear 
                                weapons

       THE COURT
       (1) By thirteen votes to one,
       Decides to comply with the request for an advisory opinion;
       IN FAVOUR: President Bedjaoui; Vice-President Schwebel; 
     Judges Guillaume, Shahabuddeen, Weeramantry, Ranjeva, 
     Herczegh, Shi, Fleischhauer, Koroma, Vereshchetin, Ferrari 
     Bravo, Higgins;
       AGAINST: Judge Oda.
       (2) Replies in the following manner to the question put by 
     the General Assembly:
       A. Unanimously,
       There is in neither customary nor conventional 
     international law any specific authorization of the threat or 
     use of nuclear weapons;
       B. By eleven votes to three,
       There is in neither customary nor conventional 
     international law any comprehensive and universal prohibition 
     of the threat or use of nuclear weapons as such;
       IN FAVOUR: President Bedjaoui; Vice-President Schwebel; 
     Judges Oda, Guillaume, Ranjeva, Herczegh, Shi, Fleischhauer, 
     Vereshchetin, Ferrari Bravo, Higgins;
       AGAINST: Judges Shahabuddeen, Weeramantry, Koroma.
       C. Unanimously,
       A threat or use of force by means of nuclear weapons that 
     is contrary to Article 2, paragraph 4, of the United Nations 
     Charter

[[Page E112]]

     and that fails to meet all the requirements of Article 51, is 
     unlawful;
       D. Unanimously,
       A threat or use of nuclear weapons should also be 
     compatible with the requirements of the international law 
     applicable in armed conflict, particularly those of the 
     principles and rules of international humanitarian law, as 
     well as with specific obligations under treaties and other 
     undertakings which expressly deal with nuclear weapons;
       E. By seven votes to seven, by the President's casting 
     vote,
       It follows from the above-mentioned requirements that the 
     threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally be contrary 
     to the rules of international law applicable in armed 
     conflict, and in particular the principles and rules of 
     humanitarian law;
       However, in view of the current state of international law, 
     and of the elements of fact at its disposal, the Court cannot 
     conclude definitively whether the threat or use of nuclear 
     weapons would be lawful or unlawful in an extreme 
     circumstance of self-defence, in which the very survival of a 
     State would be at stake;
       IN FAVOUR: President Bedjaoui; Judges Ranjeva, Herczegh, 
     Shi, Fleischhauer, Vereshchetin, Ferrari Bravo;
       AGAINST: Vice-President Schwebel; Judges Oda, Guillaume, 
     Shahabuddeen, Weeramantry, Koroma, Higgins.
       F. Unanimously,
       There exists an obligation to pursue in good faith and 
     bring to a conclusion negotiations leading to nuclear 
     disarmament in all its aspects under strict and effective 
     international control.
       Done in English and in French, the English text being 
     authoritative, at the Peace Palace, The Hague, this eighth 
     day of July, one thousand nine hundred and ninety-six, in two 
     copies, one of which will be placed in the archives of the 
     Court and the other transmitted to the Secretary-General of 
     the United Nations.
     [Signed] President
     [Signed] Registrar

     

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