Model Nuclear Weapons Convention Now Official UN Document
The revised Model Nuclear Weapons Convention (UN/62/650) for "General and complete disarmament" is now accessible in the six UN languages on the UN Documents website: www.un.org/documents.
As stated in the document, this revised model takes into account relevant technical, legal and political developments since 1997.
You can view it in the following language versions:
An excerpt from the opening remarks "What does it mean to advance the vision of a world free of nuclear weapons?" by Sergio Duarte, High Representative for Disarmament Affairs - United Nations, in Oslo, Norway:
"The future of global nuclear disarmament will require much more than unilateral actions or non-binding agreements. Given the sensitivity of their perceived national security interests, States that possess nuclear weapons would not likely give them up in exchange for informal understandings, political assurances, vague promises, or toasts. They would instead want the commitments registered in the most binding form possible. Together, these binding commitments constitute the "rule of law" for disarmament.
Relevant measures in this area would include some sign that the states possessing nuclear weapons are at least considering, individually or collectively, the outlines of what a "nuclear-weapons convention" would have to contain.
The lack of evidence of any such consideration only gives rise to new doubts about the seriousness of the commitments of these States to disarmament. It is in no way premature for States possessing nuclear weapons to /discuss /the feasibility and merits of such a convention. One early indicator of real progress in disarmament will come when the Conference on Disarmament is able to commence negotiations - or even discussions - on a nuclear-weapons convention."
The full speech is available here (pdf).
