Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material

The Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material is a key line of defense, particularly in preventing nuclear material from illicitly entering the stream of commerce, especially with the intent of diverting its use to non-peaceful purposes. The Convention came into its present version some twenty years ago and the years since its entry into force have revealed both its strengths and weaknesses. The United States believes that the time has come to revise the Convention, especially to achieve better conformity between its provisions and current internationally accepted norms for the physical protection of nuclear material and facilities and to adapt the Convention to the needs that have emerged in the 1990s. In 1998, the U.S. began an initiative to strengthen the international physical protection regime. Our initiative included a proposal for specific revisions to the Convention, which received strong support from many States providing their views, although several States expressed reservations about certain provisions of the proposal. Because there was not consensus, we decided it was premature to request the convening of a Revision Conference pursuant to Article 20 of the Convention to consider that particular proposal. In May 1999, IAEA Director General ElBaradei announced his decision to convene an Informal Open-Ended Meeting, November 15-19, 1999, at the IAEA to consider the question of whether there is a need to revise the Convention. The Expert Meeting decided to continue its work through an open-ended Working Group, which will report back to the Expert Meeting by May 2001. The Working Group has now held two meetings. This paper will discuss how the efforts to date are contributing to finding a consensus approach to updating the Convention and otherwise strengthening the international physical protection regime.