(Con):...Outside the big players, Iran is, predictably, ignoring
the 2015 nuclear deal or Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, as it
is called, and speeding up uranium enrichment thanks to American
rejection, while tensions now rise daily in the Arabian Gulf. We
wait to see whether the European powers, including the UK, can
rescue the Iran nuclear deal at this stage and whether the offered
release of the Iranian oil tanker at Gibraltar will in any way ease
the situation. Meanwhile Kim Jong-un carries on with his missile
and nuclear programme, despite Mr Trump’s wooing efforts. Then
there are the unofficial nuclear states,
notably India and Pakistan, which carry
on their bitter 70 year-old hostility...
(Con): If my noble friend will allow me, there
is an important recommendation in view of the recent tension
between India and Pakistan. The committee made a sensible
recommendation to invite India and Pakistan to attend the next P5
meeting; they have been included in past discussions. I see that
the Government’s response merely says:
“Such an invitation would require the explicit agreement of all
members of the P5”.
Does my noble friend know whether the Government will propose
that to the other members?
: Like my
noble friend, I am not enlightened by the Government’s reply. It
would be a very good idea, but the P5 would have to do it. As the
UK is its chair, it may have some additional influence in
persuading that step to be taken. I very much hope so...
(CB):...It
would be foolish to assert that the auguries for next year’s
review conference are particularly promising. They are not, and
there are going to be limits to what one country, such as the UK,
can do to improve those prospects, but the case for attendance by
the Foreign Secretary at that conference seems compelling. I
would like to hear what the Minister thinks. It seems to me that
there is a case for using our current chairmanship of the P5 to
good effect. I would like to hear a response to the question
asked by the noble Lord, , who said,
”Okay, it needs the P5 to agree to invite India and Pakistan for dialogue,
but are we going to try?” We should surely do everything we can
to ensure that the review conference reaches some useful agreed
conclusions, however difficult that may prove. Another failure to
agree any conclusions at all, which would follow the failure at
the last review conference in 2015, would send precisely the
wrong signals around the world at a time when
the risks from nuclear weapons are increasing and have become a
serious warning to us all...
(GP):...There
is also the unequal way in which the West treats emerging nuclear
powers, casting a blind eye to the nuclear weapons of
Israel, India and Pakistan while taking a
hard-line stance against Iran and North Korea. All the while, the
non-nuclear countries which signed up to the nuclear
non-proliferation treaty must feel cheated that the nuclear
countries are not holding up their end of the bargain to
progressively disband their nuclear arsenals. Instead, we are
renewing Trident and expanding nuclear arsenals...
(Lab):...First, to state
the opposite, there has not been a complete absence of nuclear
proliferation. The number of nuclear states has almost doubled,
from five to nine, during the time of the treaty. The four
nuclear states who are outside the NPT have a fraction of the
number of warheads held by NPT nuclear states, but they
are significant none the less. We list them in
our report. It is estimated that Pakistan has 140 to 150 nuclear
warheads; India has 130 to 140; Israel has
80; and North Korea 10 to 20. Of course, North Korea is a special
case for all sorts of reasons that I cannot possibly go into, but
are the other nuclear states outside the ambit of the NPT now in
the “impossible to resolve” category—“We can’t do anything about
it, so let’s not even try”—or is there a medium or longer than
medium-term strategy to try to bring all the states of the United
Nations within the ambit of the treaty?
(LD):...This is
one area where perhaps some of us would disagree with the noble
Baroness, Lady Jones, because during the Cold War mutually
assured destruction was something that mattered. Yes, firing a
nuclear weapon might be totally abhorrent, but its existence and
its potential to create a deterrent effect worked incredibly
well. Arguably, it works for India and Pakistan in the current
period. What it cannot do, however, as our report makes clear, is
deal with some of the new areas of risk and proliferation. This
is one of the greatest changes in the post-Cold War era. We face
the risk of terrorists potentially getting nuclear capability
but, from our evidence, that risk appears relatively minor. What
are much more serious, as we heard from the noble Lord, Lord
Browne, and the noble and right reverend Lord,
Lord Harries, are the dangers of hybridity and cyber, and the
vulnerability of our own nuclear deterrent...
(Con):...In an
intervention, my noble friend Lord King raised the position
of India and Pakistan. Having made his
intervention, he now seems to have disappeared, but I will share
with the rest of the Chamber that he wondered if they would be
parties to the next P5 dialogue. It is correct that that would
require the agreement of all P5 members because the P5 process is
primarily for NPT issues, but we encourage discussion among all
these countries in a variety of fora, so we have noted those
important concerns. In addition, we plan to engage in discussions
on transparency and risk reduction with all state parties...
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