The FMCT and Germany: Encouraging the Process

he presentation will illustrate the benefits that are expected from an FMCT, the disagreements on scope and verification, the most important problems of verification that are specific for an FMCT, and several suggestions of how to start work on solving these problems. Germany has always attached a high priority to an FMCT. It welcomed the idea when it was first proposed and actively participated in the Conference on Disarmament (CD) in working out the 1995 compromise Shannon Mandate from which it has never deviated. In its Annual Disarmament Report 2009, the Foreign Ministry emphasizes its determination to promote negotiations in the CD: „The Federal Government attaches principle importance to an FMCT as a logical step towards further nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. In international bodies and in bilateral contacts, Germany firmly campaigns for the soon start of FMCT negotiations in the CD, and, for the period of this report, again kept substantiating this goal by concrete initiatives.”2 Germany is a non-nuclear weapon state with a strong interest in nuclear disarmament and nuclear arms control. It also has a civilian nuclear industry with a long time tradition of IAEA safeguards, and a domestic debate on the future of nuclear industry. This background influences the preferences for the scope and verification of an FMCT, and can be regarded as typical for several states in a comparable situation. This paper will give an overview on variations of scope and verification of an FMCT, with a focus on German interest.