IMPLEMENTING THE STATE-LEVEL APPROACH: Moving Forward

The State-level approach provides a new foundation for safeguards implementation and evaluation. This represents a fundamentally new direction for the IAEA safeguards system – one that provides for enhanced effectiveness (in terms of better focusing safeguards effort) and efficiency (in terms of better utilisation of IAEA verification resources). While the State-level approach is being applied to all States with safeguards agreements, the optimisation of the approach can only be achieved for a State with both a Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement and an Additional Protocol in force and for whom the Agency concludes that the declared nuclear material in the State has not been diverted and provides credible assurance of the absence of undeclared nuclear material and activities in the State as a whole. On this basis, the Agency can move to a State-level integrated safeguards approach. Canada achieved this broad conclusion for the first time in September, 2005 and it has been maintained annually since that time. Accordingly, the IAEA and the Canadian S.S.A.C. have been pursuing the implementation of a State-level integrated safeguards approach for Canada. The initiative is well-advanced and the target for completion remains mid-2009. This paper will discuss the State-level approach in the context of the next steps in international safeguards. In doing so, it will briefly outline the primary elements of the concept and identify some considerations relevant to the continued evolution of the approach. Finally, the paper will review, in general terms, the application of the approach to Canada thereby providing a country-specific context to the evolving conceptual framework.