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Parties to the treaty
Afghanistan
Albania
Algeria
Andorra
Angola
Antigua and Barbuda
Argentina
Armenia
Australia
Austria
Azerbaijan
The Bahamas
Bahrain
Bangladesh
Barbados
Belarus
Belgium
Belize
Benin
Bhutan
Bolivia
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Botswana
Brazil
Brunei
Bulgaria
Burkina Faso
Burundi
Cambodia
Cameroon
Canada
Cape Verde
Central African Republic
Chad
Chile
People's Republic of China
Republic of China (Taiwan)1
Colombia
Comoros
Democratic Republic of the Congo
Republic of the Congo
Costa Rica
C#244;te d'Ivoire
Croatia
Cuba
Cyprus
Czech Republic
Denmark
Djibouti
Dominica
Dominican Republic
East Timor
Ecuador
Egypt
El Salvador
Equatorial Guinea
Eritrea
Estonia
Ethiopia
Fiji
Finland
France
Gabon
The Gambia
Georgia
Germany
Ghana
Greece
Grenada
Guatemala
Guinea
Guinea-Bissau
Guyana
Haiti
Holy See (Vatican City)
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Ireland
Italy
Jamaica
Japan
Jordan
Kazakhstan
Kenya
Kiribati
South Korea
Kuwait
Kyrgyzstan
Laos
Latvia
Lebanon
Lesotho
Liberia
Libya
Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Macedonia
Madagascar
Malawi
Malaysia
Maldives
Mali
Malta
Republic of the Marshall Islands
Mauritania
Mauritius
Mexico
Federated States of Micronesia
Moldova
Monaco
Mongolia
Morocco
Mozambique
Myanmar
Namibia
Nauru
Nepal
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Niger
Nigeria
Norway
Oman
Palau
Panama
Papua New Guinea
Paraguay
Peru
Philippines
Poland
Portugal
Qatar
Romania
Russia2
Rwanda
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Samoa
San Marino
S#227;o Tom#233; and Pr#237;ncipe
Saudi Arabia
Senegal
Serbia and Montenegro3
Seychelles
Sierra Leone
Singapore
Slovakia
Slovenia
Solomon Islands
Somalia
South Africa
Spain
Sri Lanka
Sudan
Suriname
Swaziland
Sweden
Switzerland
Syria
Tajikistan
Tanzania
Thailand
Togo
Tonga
Trinidad and Tobago
Tunisia
Turkey
Turkmenistan
Tuvalu
Uganda
Ukraine
United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
United States
Uruguay
Uzbekistan
Vanuatu
Venezuela
Vietnam
Yemen4
Zambia
Zimbabwe
Treaty pillars
First pillar: non-proliferation
Five states are permitted by the NPT to own nuclear weapons: France (signed 1992), the People's Republic of China (1992), Soviet Union (1968; obligations and rights now assumed by Russia), United Kingdom (1968), and the United States (1968). These were the only states possessing such weapons at the time the treaty was opened to signature, and are also the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. These 5 Nuclear Weapons States (NWS) agree not to transfer "nuclear weapons or other nuclear explosive devices" technology to other states, and non-NWS parties agree not to seek or develop nuclear weapons.
The 5 NWS parties have made undertakings not to use their nuclear weapons against a non-NWS party except in response to a nuclear attack, or a conventional attack in alliance with a Nuclear Weapons State. However, these undertakings have not been incorporated formally into the treaty, and the exact details have varied over time. The United States, for instance, has indicated that it may use nuclear weapons in response to a non-conventional attack by "rogue states". The previous United Kingdom Secretary of State for Defence, Geoff Hoon, has also explicitly invoked the possibility of the use of the country's nuclear weapons in response to a non-conventional attack by "rogue states". In January 2006, Jacques Chirac of France indicated that an incident of state-sponsored terrorism on France could trigger a small-scale nuclear retaliation aimed at destroying the "rogue state's" power centers.
Second pillar: disarmament
Article VI and the preamble indicate that the NWS parties pursue plans to reduce and liquidate their stockpiles; Article VI also calls for "...a Treaty on general and complete disarmament under strict and effective international control." In Article I, the Nuclear Weapon States declare not to "induce any non-nuclear-weapon State to ... acquire nuclear weapons." A preemptive-strike doctrine and otherwise threatening postures can be viewed as induction by non-NWS parties. Article X states that any state can withdraw from the treaty if they feel that "extraordinary events", for example a perceived threat, force them to do so.
Third pillar: the right to peacefully use nuclear technology
Since very few of the nuclear weapons states and states using nuclear reactions for energy generation are willing to completely abandon possession of nuclear fuel, the third pillar of the NPT provides other states with the possibility to do the same, but under conditions intended to make it difficult to develop nuclear weapons.
For some states, this third pillar of the NPT, which allows uranium enrichment for fuel reasons, seems to be a major loophole. However the treaty gives every state the inalienable right to use nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, and as the commercially popular light water reactor nuclear power station designs use enriched uranium fuel, it follows that states must be allowed to enrich uranium or purchase it on an international market. Peaceful uranium enrichment can arguably be considered a small step away from developing nuclear warheads, and this can be done by withdrawing from the NPT. No state is known to have successfully constructed a nuclear weapon in secret while subjected to NPT inspection. However, according to many sources, Israel has succeeded in developing over two hundred nuclear warheads without having been questioned or investigated by the UN Security Council.
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Transcripts of an interview with Richard Butler a former UN chief weapons inspector:-
MARY KOSTAKIDIS: So how significant is this development?
RICHARD BUTLER, FORMER UN CHIEF WEAPONS INSPECTOR: On a narrow, technical band, it is not because they have only done a lab-scale enrichment of uranium and only up to a very small percentage of enrichment. On a political level it's immensely significant. Iran is under a 30-day requirement by the Security Council to cooperate properly with the International Atomic Energy Agency and specifically to suspend its enrichment program. This announcement is in defiance of that demand by the Security Council and that is serious politically.
MARY KOSTAKIDIS: There have been mixed messages about the possibility of a US military strike against Iran. Do you see that on the horizon?
RICHARD BUTLER: I don't think one can rule it out. Sober voices, serious commentators in the United States, have already chimed in in the last couple of days to say, "This would be a disaster." "Surely this administration has no such thing in mind?" But as we have just seen, they have refused to take it off the table and, given their actions in the context of Iraq, I think, sadly, we can't rule out that they may put themselves into a position where they are going to take a military option.
MARY KOSTAKIDIS: Iran says it wants to enrich uranium for nuclear power purposes. The international community has allowed Israel, India, Pakistan to develop nuclear bombs. Why is Iran being singled out?
RICHARD BUTLER: Because of the shocking double standard that exists in the whole area of nuclear arms control. What is fundamentally at issue here is the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty of which Iran is a party. That treaty, at its core, says there should be a world of no nuclear weapons because it says those that have them should get rid of them and those that don't have them should never get them. Now, the fact is that treaty is being broken on several fronts, not just potentially by Iran in seeking to become a nuclear weapons power, but also by the United States, Britain, France, China by failing to keep their obligation to get rid of nuclear weapons, and as long as that continues to be the case, then I suspect we're going to see more Irans, as we did Israel, India and Pakistan.
MARY KOSTAKIDIS: So what's the solution, given that nations increasingly appear to want to be able to use nuclear energy as an alternative fuel?
RICHARD BUTLER: A solution is certainly desperately needed because, given the world energy situation, the use of nuclear-generated electricity is going to expand and Australia is going to be a big part of that in supplying uranium for it. What is needed in my view is that we go right back to the drawing board. The basic platform is the non-proliferation treaty, but we go right back to the drawing board and reinvigorate, redesign the fundamental rules with regard to nuclear weapons, namely that no-one should have them.
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