A new US president could bring an historic US commitment to "serious nuclear disarmament," says Australia's Gareth Evans, co-head of a new international anti-nuclear commission.
| He's assuming something, isn't he ... |
| More like smoking something |
Mr Evans today pointed to "a change in the atmosphere" in Washington, led by a bipartisan alliance of former secretaries of state Henry Kissinger and George Schultz, former defence secretary William Perry and former Senate Armed Service Committee chairman Sam Nunn.
"(They are) making over the past two years a hard-headed, realistic case for the first times in US history for serious nuclear disarmament and the prospect that will flow through into the new US administration - particularly Obama but also a McCain administration."
Mr Evans, Australia's foreign minister from 1988 to 1996 and now president of Brussels-based International Crisis Group, launched the new International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament today with co-chair Yoriko Kawaguchi, also a former foreign minister. The commission is an initiative of Kevin Rudd and Japan's PM Yasuo Fukuda to influence the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) review conference in 2010.
Mr Evans, who with Ms Kawaguchi met the PM this morning, said he was "very impressed by Prime Minister Fukuda's personal commitment and support for this exercise".
Former PM Paul Keating, who with Mr Evans established the Canberra Commission on nuclear disarmament in 1995, warned at the weekend speech the NPT was near collapse and criticised it as "perhaps the most egregious example of international double dealing of any international regime".
Mr Evans said the 2010 review needed to create a "global regime that picks up the best of the NPT, that makes it stronger and applicable universally", including to "the elephants in the room" India, Israel and Pakistan, states which had no intention of joining the NPT.
| Sorta dooms you guys to failure right off the bat, doesn't it? Not to mention Israel and China, and wannabes Iran and Saudi Arabia ... |
Membership of the Evans-Kawaguchi commission has not yet been finalised but, similarly to the Canberra Commission, is expected to include former states-people, international security authorities, and nuclear technology experts. Mr Evans said he hoped the commission could convene in October.
| At a very posh resort, of course ... |
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