VIENNA — A senior Russian nonproliferation official on Tuesday emphasized the principle of state sovereignty in nuclear security activities and made a clear distinction between nuclear security and nuclear disarmament.
Mikhail Ulyanov, director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s Department of Nonproliferation and Arms Control, said during the International Atomic Energy’s Agency’s (IAEA) International Conference on Nuclear Security that there are several principles by which Russia should abide while enhancing its legal instruments in nuclear security.
These include the acknowledgement that the state holds all responsibility to ensure the reliability of its national nuclear security, based on its own “optimal parameters,” and that international nuclear security cooperation should be voluntary, not requiring any government to disclose potentially sensitive information about its national systems.
Another principle is that international assistance to states for the development of national systems should occur only in response to the government’s requests; “such attempts should not be imposed upon anyone,” Ulyanov said. Moreover, he noted, “any attempt to link nuclear security with nuclear disarmament is counterproductive.”
One final principle, according to Ulyanov, is that the use of international fora to discuss the physical protection of weapon-grade nuclear material is “unjustified and unacceptable,” because those international organizations lack the mandate to be involved in cases involving investigations of nuclear incidents. Future cooperation, he said, lies in “strengthening and universalization” of existing legal mechanisms.
These principles reflect recent Russian actions in nuclear security and nonproliferation; for instance, Moscow has phased out the Cooperative Threat Reduction program through which the United States assisted in securing WMD materials in former Soviet territory, saying the country would manage such work within its borders without outside assistance.
In another example, Russia withdrew from this year’s fourth and final Nuclear Security Summit, arguing among other reasons that the goals of the event should be pursued without the involvement of international organizations. Russian officials remain critical of the United States’ attempts to spur bilateral engagement on nuclear security, nonproliferation, and arms control, while the Washington has called this reaction isolating and counterproductive.
