The Treraty of Tlatelolco and its current influence

Ambassador Jorge Berguño Barnes
Permanent Representative of Chile to the Disarmament Conference

The year 1962, during which the Security Council received a report on the existence of Soviet nuclear missiles in Cuba, is often viewed as the starting point for the negotiations that led to the signing of the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America. However, the point of view that translated into the political determination to maintain the region permanently free of all nuclear threats existed prior to the so-called "missile crisis". That same year, the President of Chile had stated his country's willingness to oppose all nuclear explosions, sign a convention universally banning nuclear weapons and promoting a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the Latin American subcontinent. That declaration, made to the General Assembly, was described by the Chilean delegate in the First Committee as a first stage on the road to a world free of nuclear threats, and the representative of Brazil, who was soon joined by Bolivia, Chile and Ecuador, drew up a concrete proposal to that end. In December of that year, the President of Mexico announced his intention to sign a commitment, together with some or all of the countries of Latin America, not to acquire nuclear weapons or permit their existence in the zone.

As is well known, the letter sent by President López Mateos to the Heads of State of the countries that had supported the Brazilian initiative of 1962, the joint declaration of the leaders on 29 April 1963, the adoption of resolution 1911 (XVIII) of the United Nations General Assembly, the dissemination of the presidential declaration by the delegations of Brazil and Mexico in the Disarmament Committee in Geneva and the establishment, a year later, of the Preparatory Commission (COPREDAL) in Mexico by the 17 countries that sponsored resolution 1911; and the dedication with which Mexican diplomacy, spurred by Alfonso García Robles, worked to achieve the signing of the final accord were the milestones in the shaping of the Treaty of Tlatelolco.

The first international convention establishing a nuclear-weapon-free zone was the Antarctic Treaty of 1959, which also demilitarized the entire continent of Antarctica, and was more recently made a "Natural Reserve for Peace and Science (Protocol on Environmental Protection to the Antarctic Treaty, Art. 2, Madrid, 1991). Together with the Treaty on Principles Governing the Activities of States in the Exploration and Use of Outer Space, including the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies (1967), the Treaty on the Prohibition of the Emplacement of Nuclear Weapons and Other Weapons of Mass Destruction on the Sea-bed and the Ocean Floor and the Subsoil Thereof (1971) and the Agreement Governing the Activities of States on the Moon and Other Celestial Bodies (1979, ratified by only seven States, the Antarctic Peace Zone had a limited effect on the disarmament process, despite its innovative inspection and "open sky" mechanisms. This set of instruments covered exceptional environments, lacked a multiplier effect and, due to the lack at of a unifying central objective at the time, meant that they could not reach the desired sphere of influence. The Treaty of Tlatelolco, which for a long time basically remained an aspiration, has now become the unifying axis for a major nuclear-weapon-free zone (NWFZ) in the southern hemisphere.

It has often been stated that the Treaty of Tlatelolco is a different, prior and autonomous agreement to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), and emphasis is placed on the differences in terms of prohibitions, institutional structure, control system, and, in particular, the guarantees of security materially and formally extended to the member States of Tlatelolco, unlike those of the NPT, to which the nuclear powers extend certain guarantees ad casum. Nevertheless, the fact that negotiations took place simultaneously meant that there was a certain degree of interdependence between the two instruments, with positive and not so positive aspects. On the one hand, the two treaties complement each other and the aims they pursue are mutually strengthened in benefit of a global non-proliferation system. On the other, the arduous process of signing the Tlatelolco Protocols came into being through "interpretative declarations" through which the nuclear powers renewed their negative security concessions within the narrower framework of the NPT and established provisos that run counter to the "spirit of Tlatelolco" and, more specifically, annul the international legitimacy of the broad Zone of Application laid down in Article 4.2.

The Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean is not universally in force throughout the Zone of Application specified in the aforementioned Article 4.2, for a number of reasons. The expansion of the geographical territories covered by NWFZs had advanced very slowly until recently. The second international convention that bears comparison with Tlatelolco, the Treaty on the South Pacific Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone (Treaty of Rarotonga), was concluded on 6 August 1985, 18 years after Tlatelolco, on the fortieth anniversary of the tragedy of Hiroshima. The three Suva Protocols to said Treaty, adopted by the States Parties to Rarotonga in August 1986, were initially only signed by the People's Republic of China and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics; the United States, France and the United Kingdom signed them ten years later. All in all, however, the signing of Protocol 3 (Art.1) by all the nuclear powers bears enormous importance.

The process of achieving the full enforcement of the Treaty of Tlatelolco has demanded constant efforts on the part of its States Parties. The procedure laid down in Article 28, combined with the extensive Zone of Application envisaged in Article 4, comprised an area that, in order to meet the expectations of this Article, first of all made it necessary to add "and the Caribbean" to OPANAL's name so as to incorporate all the States of the region included in said area with full, equal rights. That aim was attained through the amendment of 1991, which facilitated the accession of all the Caribbean States. That amendment process continued with the ground-breaking resolution 290 (VII) of 26 August 1992, which updated the essential aspects of the control system without affecting the Treaty's principles and political objectives. As of that moment, Tlatelolco not only renewed its vitality and began to overcome the obstacles that were preventing its full execution, but also had a "demonstration effect" on other international instruments, such as:

- the Non-Proliferation Treaty, indefinitely extended, but strengthened through a Decision to Strengthen the Review Process and a Decision on the Objectives and Principles of said Treaty, which explicitly supports initiatives for other nuclear-weapon-free zones.

- the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty, which extends a global ban on any kind of nuclear explosion.

- the Treaty that establishes a Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in Southeast Asia (Treaty of Bangkok).

- the African Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone Treaty (Treaty of Pelindaba)

A proper understanding, not only of the trigger effect of Tlatelolco on new nuclear-weapon-free zones, which are beginning to extend the nuclear-weapon-free zone to the entire Southern Hemisphere, but also of the new significance of the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean, can only be gained by examining some of the fundamental contributions that, --following extensive negotiations -- account for the main characteristics of the "Tlatelolco System". We will now refer to the basic ingredients of this System.

The Entry into Force Regime

The Treaty of Tlatelolco establishes a sui generis entry into force regime, laid down in Article 28, by virtue of which the instrument applies to a State that has ratified it once all the requirements set forth in said article have been met, unless it exercises its right to ratify the Treaty by including waivers to one or all the above-mentioned requirements. This means that Tlatelolco did not follow the traditional formula that makes a distinction between the period of opening for signature, lasting a given amount of time, and the following stage, in which only accession to the treaty is possible. Gros Espiell notes that in this context the final part of Article 11 of the Vienna Convention on Treaty Law is being applied, which covers the special ways for States to consent to their obligations ⁽¹⁾.

The stipulation contained in Article 28 does not merely consist of agreeing to a special form of consent, but of establishing a requirement for certain States to participate and comply with certain requirements. If such requirements can be individually waived by each ratifying State, the Zone of Application laid down in Article 28 enters into force only after a State complies with the conditions set forth in Article 28. At present, the Treaty has been ratified by all the independent States in the zone with the exception of Cuba, which had conditioned its signature and ratification on the end of the U.S. presence in Guantánamo, the ceasing of its policy of confrontation, and the real denuclearization of the hemisphere. As a Chilean scholar rightly points out, the first two conditions continue to be sources of conflict, but the third was fulfilled when the United States signed Additional Protocol I.⁽²⁾

The fact is that the formula for a gradual entry into force (the so-called "Brazilian formula", stemming from a preliminary draft of the Treaty presented by Brazil in COPREDAL) showed its effectiveness in the creation of a suitable framework to regulate and control nuclear energy in the region, facilitated a convergence of views between the States with the most advanced nuclear development (Argentina and Brazil), and established a precedent that could be significant to the future of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT). Article 14 of the latter provides for a special entry into force regime, through the obligatory ratification of a specific group of States. It has been said that, like Tlatelolco, the CTBT creates the conditions for its own impotence by demanding the accession of States that are not prepared to do so. The situation is not exactly the same, in the sense that Tlatelolco allowed the waiving of conditions and a gradual geographical extension, which is not the case with the CTBT. In both cases, the principles of international law help to fill the vacuum: Article 18 of the Vienna Convention on Treaty Law does so for signatory parties, whereas the concept of jus cogens applies to all other States.

The Zone of Application of Tlatelolco

In the specialized COPREDAL group in charge of defining the geographical limits of the nuclear-weapon-free zone that was to be created, Chile drew up a proposal based on the Panama Declaration, which established the so-called American Security Zone, and Article 4 of the Inter-American Reciprocal Assistance Treaty (TIAR). Both initiatives were aimed at banishing external nuclear threats and weapons from the region and required, in view of their much greater radius, a quantitatively and qualitatively broader protection zone. It should not be forgotten that the Chilean proposal established a convergence between Argentina's interest in preserving the Falkland Islands (included in the two previous initiatives referred to above), and Chile's interest in incorporating Easter and Salas y Gómez Islands (which were excluded from said initiatives, as illustrated by a chart comparing the three spheres of application). ⁽³⁾

As can easily be seen, the strategic central location established for the Zone of Application of Tlatelolco borders with that of Rarotonga, and both run along parallel 60º S, which marks the limit of the Antarctic Treaty zone. At first sight, the new African and Asian nuclear-weapon-free zones do not fit in with the Antarctic, Tlatelolco and Rarotonga tripod. The Treaty of Pelindaba is shaped around a stricter definition of maritime areas (inland waters, territorial sea, archipelago waters) than any of the other instruments that establish nuclear-weapon-free zones. However, there is a certain ambiguity in the establishment of the zone when one compares the African zone with the illustrated map in Annex 1 to the Pelindaba Treaty; this could eventually pave the way for a wider-ranging zone. ⁽⁴⁾

Pelindaba, Rarotonga and Bangkok all contain references to international maritime law, and Article VI of the Antarctic Treaty also safeguards the rights of third States on the high seas. Conversely, the precedents on which the Zone of Application of Tlatelolco were based (the Panama Declaration and the TIAR) created a potential conflict among the nuclear powers regarding rights of passage, with the exception of the People's Republic of China, and even in that case the use of the expression "territorial sea" is significant in that regard. Furthermore, Article 4 of the Treaty of Tlatelolco itself uses language that is not consistent with the contemporary concept of maritime areas, by exempting the continental territory and the territorial waters of the United States from the Zone of Application, which taken literally could lead one to believe that said Zone covers the Exclusive Economic Zone of the United States situated south of parallel 35°N; an obviously erroneous conclusion, if one takes into account the history of the Treaty. ⁽⁵⁾

In order to duly appreciate the geopolitical dimension of the Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in the Southern Hemisphere that is currently being promoted, it is important to bear in mind:

I. The Antarctic Treaty, discredited by many for covering an "uninhabited zone", became a binding force and, once the conditions for the full entry into force of the Zone of Application of the Treaty of Tlatelolco have been fulfilled, the "central piece in the creation of an atlas of military denuclearization, which began taking shape in 1959 with the Antarctic Treaty"⁽⁶⁾, will have been laid.

II. The maritime zones of the Treaties of Antarctica, Tlatelolco, Rarotonga and Bangkok are being linked without interruption.

III. The area of application of the Treaty of Bangkok, is patterned around the Exclusive Economic Zones and continental platforms of its member States, in view of maritime delimitation issues that remain pending.

IV. In future, in addition to completing those maritime delimitations, it will be necessary to clarify the position of the Australian islands in the Indian Ocean, which are referred to in Annex 1, letter B of the Treaty of Rarotonga.

V. Although the continuity of nuclear-weapon-free zones is interrupted between Africa and Latin America and between Southeast Asia and Africa, the vacuum lies in geographical areas that the UN General Assembly has declared the South Atlantic and Indian Ocean Peace Zones, respectively.

There is no doubt that the consolidation of the Southern Hemisphere Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone depends on the possibility of restricting the military use of oceans. Interpretations differ, as the unrestricted right to navigate freely is contradicted by Articles 87 and 88 of the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (Part VII. The High Seas), which make the exercise of that right dependent on the interests of other States, the rights stemming from activities in the International Area and the use of the high seas for "peaceful purposes" only; this is also the case pursuant to Articles 138 and 141, which establish the principles of conduct of States in the International Area and the use of said Area solely for peaceful purposes.

The Tlatelolco Control System

By virtue of Article 12,"the Control System shall be used in particular for the purpose of verifying: a. That devices, services and facilities intended for peaceful uses of nuclear energy are not used in the testing of or manufacture of nuclear weapons; b. That none of the activities prohibited in Article 1 of this Treaty are carried out in the territory of the Contracting Parties with nuclear materials of weapons introduced from abroad; c. That explosions for peaceful purposes are compatible with article 18 of this Treaty". The Treaty of Tlatelolco refers to the control system in Articles 13 to 18, of which articles 14 (Reports of the Parties), 15 (Special reports requested by the Secretary General), 16 (Special inspections) and 19 (Relations with the IAEA) were amended in 1992.

The changes made to Article 14 were in the wording and were designed to make the text more relevant, clearer and more specific, by avoiding duplication, adapting the text to the recommendations of the Conference of Non-Nuclear States and those of the NPT, and IAEA practices. A new paragraph was incorporated to further specify the obligations set forth in Article 11.6 of the Treaty of Tlatelolco and the IAEA Statute.

The amendment made to Article 15 is much more important, since it lays down that the Contracting Parties may request special reports. It is the Secretary General's responsibility to obtain them, since Article 11.3 stipulates that he must safeguard the functioning of the control system; however, the Council is responsible for authorizing the request. The wording specifies that such reports must stem from "any extraordinary event or circumstance", so by providing this additional degree of precision to requests for special reports, the Contracting Party's greater or lesser will to co-operate with the Secretary General becomes a forerunner to the procedure contained in Article 16.

The major changes made to Article 16 are not readily apparent due to the economy of language, but they include the following essential aspects of the new system governing special inspections:

a) Provision is made for inspections by virtue of Article 12, which puts into effect the entire control system described in paragraph 2 of said article; inspections also act as the guideline for OPANAL and the IAEA to determine the political pertinence and applicable technical procedures.

b) By virtue of Article 13, inspections may arise from safeguards agreements. In the case of Argentina and Brazil, these countries have a common system managed by ABACC to account for and control nuclear materials.

c) Parties must request special inspections through the Council, which must assess whether the procedures set forth in Article 15 have been followed; if the party concerned does not provide a satisfactory reply, the Council may request the IAEA to carry out a special inspection.

d) The Secretary General is responsible for following up on the information obtained by the Director General of the IAEA as a result of the special inspection.

e) Said information must be analyzed by the Council and a Conference of the Parties. If there has been a lack of compliance with the Treaty, this will give effect to the procedures set forth in Article 21, depending on the seriousness of the violation.⁽⁷⁾

The last amendment is a mere formality and consisted of separating the first paragraph of Article 19 as it stood originally, in order to stress the new context of co-operation between OPANAL and the IAEA. The new Article 20, which lays down OPANAL's right to enter into relations with any international organization or body established to supervise disarmament or measures for the control of armaments in any part of the world, now takes on a visionary scope. Conversely, the Inter-American Nuclear Energy Commission (IANEC), whose statute was adopted in 1959, has been inactive since 1988 (Report 1988/OAS/Sec.L/IV/2,15).

The negotiation of the above amendments, which was initiated following an invitation issued by President Aylwin of Chile to the Heads of State of Argentina and Brazil for them to take part in updating and strengthening the Treaty of Tlatelolco, was concluded in the historic Barón de Rio Branco meeting room at the Itamaraty Palace in Rio. The representatives of the three proposing countries worked out the proposal for amendments through an interesting exchange of views with Mexico's Deputy Secretary for Multilateral Affairs, ambassador Sergio González Gálvez, who represented all the Contracting Parties to the Treaty.

The formula adopted -- entrusting the International Atomic Energy Agency with the technical and material aspects of special inspections, while retaining full political control in the regional context -- was subsequently also used for the Bangkok and the Pelindaba Treaties. In essence, on stipulating that special inspections may be carried out in accordance with the obligations set forth in Article 12, Tlatelolco grants the IAEA Secretariat a sphere of competence that, in addition to strengthening the safeguards system, covers all aspects of the control system, including the possibility of bringing nuclear weapons or systems into the Zone of Application from abroad. Bangkok and Pelindaba also provide for this extension of competence in their annexes and specify (particularly the Annex to the Treaty of Bangkok) the successive procedural steps to be followed. Although the IAEA Statute makes no provision for this type of special inspections, a broad interpretation of document INFCIRC/153 (Paragraph 73b.) could provide the legal grounds.

Nuclear Explosions for Peaceful Purposes


The final paragraphs of a document that illustrates the scope of the 1992 amendments to the Treaty of Tlatelolco and that was submitted to the Disarmament Conference by the heads of the Argentinean, Brazilian and Chilean delegations state the following:

As a final consideration, it should be recalled that the IAEA is also a guarantor in the application of Article 18. No amendments have been proposed to this article, since the countries proposing the amendments have declared a self-imposed moratorium on nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes, which are temporarily limited by the technical impossibility of distinguishing between nuclear devices for warlike purposes and those that could be produced in future for exclusively peaceful purposes. As in the accords between Argentina and Brazil and between them and the IAEA, we reaffirm the alienable right to engage in nuclear development for peaceful purposes while preserving our industrial, technological and commercial secrets, including the right to use nuclear energy for the propulsion and operation of all types of vehicles; it has not been deemed necessary to make any amendment to Article 17 of Tlatelolco. ⁽⁸⁾

Although some authors have criticized Article 18 and others have advocated its elimination, we believe it has helped to strike a balance between the rights and obligations of States as a matter of principle, rather than to facilitate nuclear proliferation in the region. The thoughtful statement made by ambassador García Robles, the Chairman of COPREDAL, on opening the Treaty for signature made a strong contribution by indicating the solution that the Preamble to the Treaty suggested: it was followed by the "interpretative declarations" of the nuclear powers, based on the last phrase of Article 18: "provided that they do so in accordance with the provisions of this Article and the other articles of the Treaty, particularly Articles 1 and 5".

The reasons for the controversy are well known. Nevertheless, a close study of the obligations set forth in Article 18 and in the rest of the Treaty (including the specific reference in Article 12.2.c) and the interdependence of the obligations contained in Articles 1 and 5, shows the exact reasoning behind the solution to the moratorium, which made it subject to scientific developments. The subsequent development of the topic in the history of disarmament treaties not only shows inherent contradictions, but also led to a result that vindicates Tlatelolco's contribution to this complex issue:

I. Article V of the Antarctic Treaty banned nuclear explosions in the Antarctic, but left open the possibility of reaching international agreements to which all the Contracting Parties whose representatives were empowered to take part in the meetings provided for in Article IX would be Parties. This was in response to the objections raised by the countries that invoked the supremacy of the Disarmament Committee in Geneva or the possibility of forming a global atomic agency.

II. The Treaty for the Partial Prohibition of Nuclear Tests forbids any explosion to test nuclear weapons or any other nuclear explosions in its three spheres of application. In the report he submitted to President Kennedy, interim Secretary of State George Ball specified that nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes were banned owing to the difficulty of distinguishing between explosions to test nuclear weapons and explosions for peaceful purposes, without additional controls.

III. The Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America gave its Contracting Parties the right to carry out nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes, but made them strictly subject to additional controls.

IV. Based on the premise that only the States possessing nuclear weapons may develop explosive nuclear devices, Article 5 of the Treaty for the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons included a commitment to share the potential benefits stemming from the peaceful application of nuclear energy under appropriate international observation and following appropriate international procedures.

V. Article VIII of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty states that the Review Conference shall take note of all new scientific and technological developments and that following a request by any State Party, it shall also study the possibility of allowing underground explosions for peaceful purposes, which said Conference could adopt by consensus.

As can be seen, the CTBT, Article I of which bans all nuclear explosions in any environment, made use of the consensus formula established by the Antarctic Treaty to provide the possibility of reopening a negotiation, but on an egalitarian, unbiased basis, unlike the NPT, if scientific advances and the consensus of the parties justify it. It is a highly improbable scenario, but Article 18 of Tlatelolco, the concept of the need for prior scientific and technical assessment and a moratorium -- now an indefinite prohibition -- mark the stages of international discussion of this issue. The solution is undoubtedly the best, since nuclear explosions for peaceful purposes threatened to facilitate the rise of a new power possessing nuclear weapons, which carried the risk of temporarily suspending the execution of the Treaty, in accordance with Article 29.4.

Tlatelolco and the New Frontiers of Disarmament

The Treaty of Tlatelolco is called to play an important role in articulating approaches to security at the regional level, in the Southern Hemisphere and at a global level, while linking up with the new process of reviewing the Non-Proliferation Treaty -- in the perspective of the year 2000 -- and the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty. For Tlatelolco to fulfill its new role properly, it is a prerequisite and a determining factor to ensure its entry into force throughout its Zone of Application.

In future, to define the terms of any multilateral disarmament negotiation, it will first be essential to jointly examine the international system governing the Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones established through the Antarctic Treaty, the Treaty of Tlatelolco, the Rarotonga Treaty, the Bangkok Treaty and the Pelindaba Treaty. The virtues and deficiencies of each of these instruments will have to be studied jointly by their respective political authorities and the Treaties' technical secretariats, in a framework of co-operation and ongoing contact. In particular, this gives rise to the question of a multilateral framework of negative-security guarantees, to harmonize, improve and strengthen the existing legal systems, in terms truly in keeping with the intention of the Objectives and Principles adopted by the NPT Extension Conference.

While Tlatelolco was the first instrument to secure such guarantees, accompanied by interpretative declarations whose content should be reviewed in light of the current situation, Rarotonga had the privilege of securing the approval of the five nuclear powers through Protocol 3, which incorporates the commitment not to carry out nuclear explosions in its Zone of Application. The commitment set forth in Article 1 of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty is thus in force in that region of the world. Similarly, it is also evident that there is no reason not to apply this same standard in the zones established through the Tlatelolco, Bangkok and Pelindaba Treaties, given that it has been in force in Antarctica since 1961. ⁽⁹⁾

Even prior to its difficult and problematic enforcement, the CTBT will give rise to an International Monitoring System that will effectively fulfill the objectives of each of the treaties that make up the new International Regime Governing Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones. In turn, these zones will act as the foundation that can provide this verification system with the legitimacy needed not only to operate in functional terms, but also within a provisional legal framework prior to the entry into force of the CTBT. As a result of the support provided by Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones, the unilateral moratorium on explosions declared by the powers possessing nuclear weapons and enshrined in a General Assembly resolution could become an indefinite prohibition, applicable henceforth throughout all the Zones of Application of the respective treaties.

The Secretary General of OPANAL has pointed out a number of limitations that currently affect the International Regime Governing Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones. Some refer to the unsatisfactory status of disarmament treaties in general, which still contain excessively permissive withdrawal provisions and fail to specify the permanent nature, under all circumstances, of obligations that international law and the recent advisory opinion of the International Court of Justice unhesitatingly validate. Others stem from the aforementioned conflict between a classic view of maritime law and disarmament obligations. In appearance, this difficulty is complicated by problems of maritime boundaries, particularly in the Southeast Asian region, although the formula for enforcing the Exclusive Economic Zones contained in the Treaty of Bangkok could in fact be a means of solving the problems of territorial delimitation of Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones.

In conclusion, Free Zones must show their credibility by substantially improving their control systems. The new co-operation arrangements with the IAEA stemming from the amendments to Tlatelolco and included in the African and Southeast Asian treaties are a strong pillar of the emerging international non-proliferation system. To that end, a number of common initiatives must be established through a new statute or charter conferring new mandates to the IAEA in its relations with regional treaties. On the one hand, each instrument and its corresponding institutional framework must provide the IAEA with a more precise mandate, for which the Procedure for a Fact-Finding Mission (Annex I to the Treaty of Bangkok) provides a useful guideline. On the other, it would be of great political and legal value for all the countries that make up the Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones to be the first to support and sign an Additional Protocol to the IAEA Statute, thereby institutionalizing the progress made in the special inspections regime under Program 93+2.

Tlatelolco is thus at a crossroads that consists of assimilating the comparative advances of more recent instruments, consolidating and making its own potential more effective, and serving as a model -- in view of its more developed institutional framework -- for integrating regional security and disarmament mechanisms in the overall scenario of global disarmament. If we add the enormous capital represented by the total population and area covered by the International Regime Governing Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones to the strategic framework of multilateral disarmament negotiations, we can see that the Treaty for the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons in Latin America and the Caribbean is at the forefront of the new frontiers of disarmament, which are making the Southern Hemisphere the promised land and the precursor of a world free of nuclear threat.


Notes:

(1) Héctor Gros Espiell: En torno al Tratado de Tlatelolco y la Proscripción de las Armas Nucleares en América Latina. OPANAL, Mexico, 1973, p.27.
(2) Rodrigo Díaz Albónico: "El sistema de seguridad interamericana y sus nuevos desarrollos a través del Tratado de Tlatelolco". Estudios Internacionales, No. 51, July-September 1980, p. 359. Albónico points out that Cuba would view the Treaty of Tlatelolco as a regional NPT, imposing obligations only on non-nuclear States and leaving free rein for the nuclear arms race. This view has, however, changed: "El Reto Cubano ante la Opción Nuclear: Cuba y los tratados internacionales en la esfera nuclear". Enfoques, May 1996, Havana, pp. 6-9.
(3) The Chilean proposal was presented to the COPREDAL working group in charge of delimiting the Latin American NWFZ. The references mentioned (Panama Declaration and TIAR) are mentioned by Julio C. Carasales: "El ámbito de aplicación del Tratado de Tlatelolco y la situación de quienes no lo han ratificado". El Derecho, year XXXIII, No. 8621. Buenos Aires, 1994.
(4) Texts included in Enrique Román-Morey's paper, Las Zonas Libres de Armas Nucleares, sobre la huella del Tratado de Tlatelolco. OPANAL, Mexico City, 1997. The annex, which features the treaties and their respective maps, also includes a chart (p. xxxi) showing the full area of the Southern Hemisphere that could be free of nuclear weapons. Ambassador Román-Morey's statement that only Tlatelolco and Bangkok provide for the denuclearization of "maritime areas adjacent to the territorial waters of the costal States in the Zone" deserves further comment. The treaty that leaves the least room for interpretation is Pelindaba, due to its definition of "territory" (Art.1.b.); Rarotonga contains a similar definition (1.b) but clearly distinguishes the South Pacific Denuclearized Zone (1.a), which has other implications; Article 1.b of the Bangkok Treaty is identical to that of Rarotonga, but the Southeast Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone is based on the concept of Exclusive Economic Zones. Tlatelolco provides a broader interpretation than the other NWFZs on this point, including the Antarctic Treaty, since Article 3 defines the term "territory" as any space over which the State exercises sovereignty in accordance with its own legislation.
(5) The United Nations Group of Experts to study effective, verifiable measures to facilitate the creation of a NWFZ in the Middle East (Department of Disarmament Affairs, 1991) mentions, in its special provisions for denuclearized maritime zones, the need to secure the assent of States with navigation rights and of all the State that possess nuclear weapons. Harald Müller: "Prospects for the fourth review of the Non-Proliferation Treaty". The Non-Proliferation Treaty, edited by H. Müller and R. Kokoski, SIPRI, Stockholm, 1990, studies in depth the question of the consistency of the operating principles of some western navies with Article VIII of the NPT. Andrea García Guerra: "Hacia la integración de las zonas libres de armas nucleares en el hemisferio sur", Revista Mexicana de Política Exterior, Spring-Summer 1996, provides a convincing argument on the "right to nuclear disarmament". However, there is not only a lack of political will in this regard, but also of clear concepts and criteria on which to reach a consensus. If the concept of "continental territory and territorial waters" is applied to solve the question of the delimitation of the Zone of Application of Tlatelolco in order to exclude the United States, it will be very difficult to reach an agreement; conversely, if current international law on maritime limits is applied to the West Coast of the U.S. and the Gulf of Mexico, the merits of the formula used in the Treaty of Bangkok become evident in the sense that it makes no prejudgment on sovereignty issues.
(6) Andrea García Guerra, op.cit., p.88. On the Antarctic Treaty, as regards disarmament, see Fred Tanner: "The Antarctic Verification System: A Model for the Future". L. Calflish & F. Tanner ed. The Polar Regions and their Strategic Significance. Geneva, 1989; Jorge Berguño: The Antarctic Peace Zone and the International Monitoring System of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty. Paper submitted to the XXth Antarctic Treaty Consultative Meeting, Utrecht, 1996.
(7) Héctor Gros Espiell: "América Latina y el uso pacífico de la energía nuclear". Revista Mexicana de Política Exterior, 1996, pp. 91-106. Luis Javier Herrera Andrade: "Esquemas de verificación universal y Tratado de Tlatelolco". Revista Mexicana de Política Exterior, 1996, p.120, makes reference to the option of special inspections in cases where the information furnished by a State is not sufficient for the IAEA to fulfill its responsibility of applying safeguards to a State's entire nuclear material.
(8) Document CD/1172 of the Disarmament Conference. Letter of 2 September 1992, addressed to the Secretary General of the Disarmament Conference, drafted by the Heads of the Delegations of Argentina, Brazil and Chile to illustrate the proposed amendments to the Treaty of Tlatelolco.
(9) Kenza S.E. de García Robles. "Une alternative en matière de non-proliferation: les zones libres d'armes nucléaires" Relations Internationales et Stratégiques, No. 17, 1995, pp. 192-199.