By Pavel Podvig | 22 February 2012
The Nuclear Security Summit taking place in Seoul next month is expected to reinforce the commitment of the international community to confronting the threat of nuclear terrorism. The summit process provides a unique opportunity to ensure that nuclear security receives the high-level attention it deserves from governments around the world. It also entrusts the participants with a special responsibility not to let this opportunity pass by.
The stakes are very high and the challenge is extremely serious: The global stock of fissile material is estimated to be almost 1,440 tons of highly enriched uranium and 500 tons of separated plutonium; together, that's enough material to produce more than 100,000 weapons or nuclear explosive devices. Large amounts of weapons-usable materials are employed in a broad range of civilian and military applications, which is why they are constant security risks. If some of this material falls into the wrong hands, an act of nuclear terrorism is a real possibility.
And yet, while the global community has long recognized the threat of nuclear terrorism, the international nuclear security regime developed to counter this threat is in need of a serious overhaul. Currently, governments' obligations are too narrow, accountability is virtually absent, and institutional structures are rather weak. One of the key elements of the international nuclear security regime, the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material, covers only a very narrow category of material -- civilian nuclear material in international transport -- and lacks both accountability and enforcement mechanisms. The Amendment to the Physical Protection Convention, which would extend coverage to domestic transport and storage of nuclear material and would require states to protect their civilian nuclear facilities from sabotage, has not yet entered into force. Another nuclear security agreement, the International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism, includes an obligation to protect all nuclear material. But nowhere in the agreement is there even a suggested mechanism to ensure compliance with this provision. The convention entered into force in 2007, but a number of key nuclear states -- France, Israel, Pakistan, and the United States, among others -- have not yet ratified the accord.
The only international institution that has the requisite technical expertise in nuclear security is the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which develops guidelines and standards for physical protection and provides member states with expert advice and assistance. However, the IAEA can do very little without the direct request of a member state. And even in those cases when it is called on to review a nation's nuclear security status, the IAEA cannot ensure that its recommendations will be implemented. Also, despite the best efforts of the member states, the IAEA-managed Nuclear Security Fund cannot provide an effective mechanism for the security of nuclear materials.
Most of the weapons-usable nuclear material that exists today has been produced for military purposes. More than 60 percent of plutonium and highly enriched uranium is currently associated with military programs. It is clear that protection of this material should be an absolutely essential part of any nuclear security effort. Countries that have military material in their possession should make a strong commitment to making sure that their military stocks are safe and secure. As an initial step they could declare the amounts of weapons-grade materials in their arsenals and pledge to eliminate the material that is excess to their national security needs. A number of important steps in this direction already have been made: The United States and the United Kingdom have published information on their nuclear material stocks, and the United States and Russia have eliminated large quantities of highly enriched uranium as well as worked together to eliminate large amounts of their military plutonium. The Nuclear Security Summit will provide an opportunity to vigorously support and strengthen these existing nuclear security mechanisms and to ensure that they constitute a norm for all states that have military nuclear materials.
But to be truly effective, the participants should go beyond the existing legal and institutional structures and try to create new initiatives that focus on specific core issues:
Building on the success of the first summit, held in the U.S. in 2010, the Seoul meeting is well-positioned to ensure that nuclear security remains at the top of the international security agenda. At the same time, the summit participants will have to deal with significant challenges in how to secure nuclear materials and prevent nuclear terrorist attacks.
The scope of these challenges becomes clear when we consider the amounts of nuclear material that have been accumulated worldwide. The global stock of fissile material is estimated to be almost 1,475 tons of highly enriched uranium and 485 tons of separated plutonium, which is enough to produce more than 100,000 weapons.
Large amounts of weapon-usable materials are used in a variety of civilian and military applications, presenting a constant security risk. If some of this material falls into the wrong hands, an act of nuclear terrorism might become a real possibility.
Preventing terrorism
Another danger is that nuclear facilities, such as nuclear power plants, spent fuel storage pools or reprocessing plants could become targets of a terrorist attack. It is quite possible that the damage to these facilities caused by a malicious act would far exceed the damage caused by human error or force of nature, as in Chernobyl and Fukushima.
These accidents demonstrated that even a limited release of radioactivity could have serious long-term heath and economic consequences.
The international community has long recognized the threat of nuclear terrorism. The key elements of the international nuclear security regime that was developed to counter this threat are the Convention on the Physical Protection of Nuclear Material and the International Convention for the Suppression of Acts of Nuclear Terrorism.
These conventions require countries to provide adequate protection of their nuclear materials and create a legal framework for prosecuting acts of nuclear terrorism.
Most of the technical expertise in the nuclear security area is concentrated in the International Atomic Energy Agency, which develops guidelines and standards for physical protection and provides member states with expert advice and assistance.
Strengthening these elements of the global nuclear security regime is an important part of the Seoul summit's agenda. In particular, the summit could help bring closer the entry into force of the Amendment to the Physical Protection Convention, which would extend the coverage of the convention to domestic transport and storage of nuclear material and would require states to protect their civilian nuclear facilities from sabotage.
The summit is also likely to see its participants make new commitments to secure or eliminate dangerous materials and boost the IAEA role in this effort.
Better transparency
There are several other areas where the Seoul summit could make an important contribution to the strengthening of the current nuclear security mechanisms: extending the physical protection obligations to all categories of nuclear materials, improving transparency and accountability, and building an institutional framework for better international cooperation.
Most of the weapon-usable nuclear material that exists today has been produced for military purposes. More than 60 percent of plutonium and highly enriched uranium is currently associated with military programs. It is clear that protection of this material should be an absolutely essential part of any nuclear security effort.
Countries that have military material in their possession should make a strong commitment to making sure that their military stocks are safe and secure. As an initial step they could declare the amounts of weapon-grade materials in their arsenals and pledge to eliminate the material that is in excess of their national security needs.
A number of important steps in this direction have already been made ― the U.S. and the U.K. have published information on their nuclear material stocks. The U.S. and Russia have eliminated large quantities of highly enriched uranium and have been working to eliminate large amounts of their military plutonium as well. The Nuclear Security Summit will provide an opportunity to strongly support these steps and to ensure that they constitute a norm for all states that have military nuclear materials.
To further promote transparency and accountability regarding nuclear materials, the Nuclear Security Summit could consider creating a mechanism that would ensure that all countries report their holdings of civilian nuclear material to the IAEA.
This practice already exists today ― most states that have separated civilian plutonium submit annual declarations of their stocks to the IAEA. Some also report their civilian highly enriched uranium holdings.
Making these reports universal will ensure that these nuclear materials are properly accounted for, which is an essential step in ensuring their security. Furthermore, the summit could consider asking the states to report on the level of physical protection at their nuclear facilities.
With appropriate care, these reports would not disclose any sensitive information while providing accountability that ensures that states follow the IAEA recommendations and guidelines in implementing basic protection measures.
If necessary, these reports could use the mechanism developed by the U.N. Security Council Resolution 1540 that successfully monitored the status of national legislations in the area of combating proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
To ensure that physical protection measures are adequate to the level of threat, participants of the Nuclear Security Summit could consider establishing a forum that would bring together security professionals ― intelligence and law enforcement agencies ― for consultations on threat assessment.
Coordination of efforts in this area would allow efficient exchange of the best practices and would help states develop their national physical protection programs to deal with threats.
Past successes
Finally, the nuclear summit process should carefully study the experience of successful international cooperation programs that helped improve nuclear security in the former Soviet Union and that worked on removing and securing vulnerable materials worldwide.
These are the U.S.-Russian Cooperative Threat Reduction program, the G8 Global Partnership, and the U.S. Global Threat Reduction Initiative.
These programs demonstrated that with strong political support states could work together to implement a very ambitious set of goals. To build on the success of these programs, the Nuclear Security Summit should encourage its participants to build partnerships that would bring the resources and commitment that are required to strengthen the nuclear security regime.
One of the most challenging aspects of nuclear security is the multifaceted character of the problem that requires coordination of efforts of many states in many areas. This makes the Nuclear Security Summit process particularly important, since it provides a unique forum that could provide political support to the most ambitious nuclear security programs and work effectively toward their implementation.
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