O 112211Z JUN 08
FM AMEMBASSY CANBERRA
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C O N F I D E N T I A L CANBERRA 000595 
 
SIPDIS 
NOFORN 
 
STATE FOR ISN, EAP AND T 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 06/10/2018 
TAGS: KNNP AORC PREL AS
SUBJECT: RUDD ESTABLISHES NEW NPT/DISARMAMENT COMMISSION 
 
REF: A. CANBERRA 585 B. CANBERRA 587 
 
Classified By: DCM Daniel A. Clune. Reasons: 1.4 (b),(d) 
 
SUMMARY 
------- 
¶1. (C) During a June 9 speech in Japan, Prime Minister Kevin 
Rudd announced the establishment of a new international 
commission to advance the goals of the Nuclear 
Nonproliferation Treaty (NPT).  The new body -- the 
International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and 
Disarmament -- would study previous efforts aimed at 
elimination of nuclear weapons and report to an international 
conference of experts hosted by Australia in 2009 to develop 
recommendations ahead of the 2010 NPT Review Conference. 
Rudd's announcement follows by only a few days his rollout of 
another major aspirational goal:  the creation of an EU-style 
Asia Pacific Community by 2010.  As with the Asia Pacific 
union concept, Rudd apparently rushed the announcement of the 
new nonproliferation body, to be headed by former Australian 
foreign minister Gareth Evans, apparently with little 
internal consultation and no advance consultations with NPT 
member states, after failing to convince the Japanese to 
announce it as a joint initiative.  An excerpt from his 
speech dealing with nonproliferation follows in para 10 
below.  End summary. 
 
REVITALIZING THE NUCLEAR NONPROLIFERATION REGIME 
--------------------------------------------- --- 
¶2. (U) In a June 9 speech at Kyoto University, Prime Minister 
Rudd used the occasion of his visit to the Hiroshima peace 
memorial earlier in the day to announce that Australia would 
establish an International Commission on Nuclear 
Non-Proliferation and Disarmament to halt the continued 
fragmentation of the NPT and prevent the failure or 
disintegration of the 2010 Review Conference.  Citing the 
development of nuclear threats in North Korea and Iran, and 
decrying the diminished focus on the core NPT goal of 
elimination of nuclear weapons, despite progress on reduction 
of stockpiles, Rudd said the international community needed 
to "exert every global effort to restore and defend the 
treaty."  The Commission would develop an action plan and 
report to an Australian-hosted "international conference of 
experts" in 2009 ahead of the Review Conference.  Rudd did 
not elaborate further on the international conference. 
 
STRENGTHENED COMPLIANCE, FUEL CYCLE MANAGEMENT AND CTBT 
--------------------------------------------- ---------- 
¶3. (U) In making his announcement, Rudd cited the warning by 
former secretaries of state George Shultz and Henry 
Kissinger, former Secretary of Defense William J. Perry, and 
former Chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee Sam 
Nunn, contained in a January 15, 2008, Wall Street Journal 
article, that proliferation of nuclear weapons, materials and 
technology had brought the world to a "nuclear 
tipping-point."  He highlighted three of the eight 
recommendations in the WSJ article for consideration by the 
new Commission, including: 
-- strengthening compliance with the NPT by requiring all NPT 
signatories to adopt IAEA-designed monitoring provisions 
(i.e., Additional Protocols); 
Q(i.e., Additional Protocols); 
-- developing an international system to manage the nuclear 
fuel cycle; and 
-- adopting a process to bring the Comprehensive Nuclear Test 
Ban Treaty (CTBT) into force. 
 
¶4. (U) Rudd suggested the new Commission would review and 
carry forward the work of two similar bodies -- the Canberra 
Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons, a 
short-lived initiative of Australian Labor Party (ALP) Prime 
Minister Paul Keating in 1995 and the 1998 Tokyo Forum on 
Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament -- aimed at 
repairing the nonproliferation regime and promoting 
disarmament.  Rudd named as "co-chair" of the Commission 
Gareth Evans, a former Foreign Minister who had overseen the 
Canberra Commission and who currently serves as President and 
CEO of the Brussels-based Crisis International Group. 
 
ANOTHER RUDD INITIATIVE WITHOUT CONSULTATION? 
--------------------------------------------- 
¶5. (C) Like Rudd's June 4 announcement of his vision for an 
EU-style Asia Pacific Community by 2010 (ref A), PM Rudd's 
June 9 announcement caught many by surprise, including within 
his own government.  Valerie Grey (protect), outgoing 
Director for Arms Control in the Arms Control and 
Counter-Proliferation Branch, who is responsible for NPT and 
IAEA matters in the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade, 
told us flatly that no one in the Prime Minister's office had 
consulted with the Branch in advance of the remarks. 
Embassies of other P5 members in Canberra, including the 
British and Russians, confirmed their governments had not 
been consulted in advance.  Tellingly, the PM's Senior 
Advisor for International Affairs, who first notified us by 
phone from Kyoto after the PM had delivered his speech, 
disclosed that Rudd had tried to convince the Japanese to 
jointly announce the initiative, apparently while he was in 
Japan.  When he was unable to secure GOJ agreement, Rudd went 
ahead with the announcement because he didn't want to lose 
the "catalytic moment" of his visit to Hiroshima, where he 
had placed a wreath at the Peace Memorial. 
 
MIXED REACTION 
-------------- 
¶6. (SBU) Reaction to the commission has been mixed.  Greg 
Sheridan, one of the more respected journalists, panned the 
concept and choice of chair in a trenchant piece in The 
Australian the following day entitled "Worthy Plan Stands to 
Break Zero Ground."  Sheridan wrote that "A commission of 
worthies proposed in Japan by an Australian prime minister on 
his first official visit is not going to have the slightest 
effect on nuclear proliferation, much less disarmament...Any 
progress towards nonproliferation and disarmament has never 
emerged from a small nation gathering together a few retired 
diplomats and superannuated (politicians) to produce a wordy 
document stating the obvious, which is pretty much what the 
Canberra Commission did...Any document written by Evans is 
bound to be lengthy, well-informed, well researched, 
judicious, professional, comprehensive, pedantic and 
ineffective."  He concluded,"Provided no one mistakes it for 
serious national security policy, Rudd's commission will do 
no harm, and equally it will do no good." 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
¶7. (C/NF) Along with other members of the diplomatic 
community here, we are struggling to understand why a careful 
operative like Rudd, with his solid bureaucratic and 
diplomatic credentials, continues to risk undermining support 
for his goals by failing to consult with stakeholders and 
build support from within.  Part of the explanation may be 
his overriding domestic political focus.  The Prime Minister 
and his closest advisers appear not to have totally completed 
the transition from campaigning to governing and, at times, 
appear more focused on controlling the 24-hour news cycle 
than on the hard work of building support for and 
implementing new initiatives.  In addition, in launching the 
initiatives, the Prime Minister has relied on his own small 
Qinitiatives, the Prime Minister has relied on his own small 
staff, which often operates independently from the rest of 
the bureaucracy, including the more generously-staffed 
Department of the Prime Minister and Cabinet. 
 
¶8. (C/NF) The Prime Minister also seems determined to fulfill 
all of his election promises as quickly as possible, starting 
with signing the Kyoto Protocol on December 3, 2007, within 
hours after being sworn in as Prime Minister.  During the 
lead-up to the November 2007 election, Rudd's foreign affairs 
spokesperson had told the Lowy Institute in March 2007 that a 
Rudd government would convene another "Canberra Commission" 
of international eminent persons to recommend steps to 
prevent proliferation, as well as to work towards treaties on 
fissile material cut-off levels and disarmament.  In this 
sense, he may be more interested in ticking the boxes than in 
giving substance or follow-through to these undertakings. 
 
¶9. (C/NF) But this does not adequately explain Rudd's 
puzzling failure to consult.  It is certainly true that he 
has alienated his bureacracy (Ref B), and that, combined with 
a relatively green team of staff and advisers with a party 
that has been out of office for almost 12 years, may have 
contributed to this failure.  In any event, we are beginning 
to canvass senior officials and advisers and hope to shed 
more light on Rudd's foreign policy and decision-making 
process in the coming weeks.  End comment. 
 
EXCERPT FROM PM RUDD'S JUNE 9 SPEECH 
------------------------------------ 
¶10. (U) In the past decade, the world has not paid adequate 
attention to nuclear weapons. 
There have been nuclear developments that we have had to 
confront - like North Korea's nuclear program and the danger 
it poses to the region; as well as Iran's continued nuclear 
ambitions. 
And there has been some thinking about new ways to counter 
the threat of weapons proliferation. 
Australia and Japan were both founding partners in the 
Proliferation Security Initiative (PSI). 
And Australia and Japan cooperate closely on export controls 
in the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG). 
These help to support the cornerstone of the global effort to 
eliminate nuclear weapons - in particular the Nuclear 
Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). 
But there has not been the same focus on the danger of 
nuclear weapons that we saw at the height of the Cold War. 
In some ways that is understandable - nuclear weapon 
stockpiles have come down a long way since their peaks in the 
1980s. 
 
The two main nuclear powers, our shared ally the United 
States and Russia, have negotiated a series of treaties that 
have cut the number of nuclear weapons. 
And South Africa and Ukraine have shown that it is possible 
for countries that have nuclear weapons to eliminate them. 
We no longer live with the daily fear of nuclear war between 
two superpowers. 
But nuclear weapons remain. 
New states continue to seek to acquire them. 
Some states including in our own region are expanding their 
existing capacity. 
Hiroshima reminds us of the terrible power of these weapons. 
Hiroshima should remind us that we must be vigilant afresh to 
stop their continued proliferation. 
And we must be committed to the ultimate objective of a 
nuclear weapons free world. 
The cornerstone of the global nuclear disarmament efforts 
remains the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). 
It is a treaty that is grounded in the reality of the 
existence of nuclear weapons, but with a firm goal of their 
eventual elimination. 
It is a treaty that, by any historical measure, has helped 
arrest the spread of nuclear weapons - particularly given the 
proliferation pressures that existed across states in the 
1960s when the treaty was negotiated. 
But 40 years later the treaty is under great pressure. 
Some states have developed nuclear weapons outside the 
treaty's framework. 
 
Some, like North Korea, have defied the international 
community and have stated that they have left the treaty 
altogether. Others like Iran defy the content of the treaty 
by continuing to defy the IAEA - the agency assigned to give 
the treaty force. There are two courses of action available 
to the community of nations: to allow the NPT to continue to 
Qto the community of nations: to allow the NPT to continue to 
fragment; or to exert every global effort to restore and 
defend the treaty. 
Australia stands unambiguously for the treaty.  I accept 
fully that we have a difficult task ahead of us. 
But I believe Japan and Australia working together can make a 
difference in the global debate on proliferation. 
We are uniquely qualified. 
 
Japan remains the only state to have experienced the 
consequences of nuclear weapons.  Japan today has a large 
nuclear power industry. 
Australia has the largest known uranium reserves in the 
world. We can, therefore, understand the concerns that 
countries bring to this debate. 
 
And we share a view of the importance of the NPT. 
Australia and Japan are also both recognised as being 
committed to non-proliferation, including through our strong 
support for the International Atomic Energy Agency. 
Each year, for more than a decade, Japan has put forward a UN 
resolution on nuclear disarmament. 
Each year, Australia is proud to be a co-sponsor of that 
resolution. 
We do more than just vote for it. 
 
Alongside Japan we present it to the international community 
and jointly seek their support. 
Australia itself for the last quarter century has developed 
strong global credentials in arms control and disarmament - 
through our establishment of the Australia Group; our work in 
the United Nations on the Chemical Weapons Convention and as 
one of its original signatories; and our work on the 
Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty. 
Australia and Japan have also both been at the forefront of 
global thinking on the long-term challenge of nuclear 
weapons. In the 1990s, Australia convened the Canberra 
Commission on the Elimination of Nuclear Weapons. 
Japan in the late 1990s established the Tokyo Forum for 
Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament. 
These two bodies produced reports that have become benchmarks 
in the international community's efforts to deal with nuclear 
weapons. 
I think it is time we looked anew at the questions they 
addressed and revisited some of the conclusions they reached. 
 
The NPT Review Conference will be held in 2010. 
It is the five yearly meeting of parties to the treaty to 
assess progress against the treaty's aims and look at how we 
can strengthen its provisions. 
As former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said in 2007, 
nuclear non-proliferation is the most important issue facing 
the world today. 
So, before we get to the Review Conference, we need to do 
some serious thinking about how we support the treaty and how 
we move forward on our goals. 
 
I announce today that Australia proposes to establish an 
International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and 
Disarmament, to be co-chaired by former Australian foreign 
minister Gareth Evans.  The Commission will re-examine the 
Canberra Commission and the Tokyo Forum reports to see how 
far we have come, how much work remains, and develop a 
possible plan of action for the future. The Commission will 
report to a major international conference of experts in late 
2009 that will be sponsored by Australia. 
 
I look forward to discussing with Japan their participation 
in the work of this commission. 
Australia and Japan have also agreed to establish a 
high-level dialogue on non-proliferation and disarmament to 
advance this critical international debate. 
 
It is intended that the Commission and the subsequent 
conference will help pave the way for the NPT Review 
Conference in 2010.  We cannot simply stand idly by and allow 
another Review Conference to achieve no progress - or worse 
to begin to disintegrate. 
The treaty is too important. 
The goal of nuclear non-proliferation is too important. 
Even with these additional efforts, there is no guarantee of 
QEven with these additional efforts, there is no guarantee of 
success. 
But that should not deter us from exerting every diplomatic 
effort. 
 
This is a view shared by people with unique experience in 
strategic policy. 
In the United States, former Secretaries of State George 
Shultz and Henry Kissinger, former Defence Secretary William 
Perry, and former Chairman of the US Senate Armed Services 
Committee Sam Nunn said in an important article the Wall 
Street Journal in January: 
"The accelerating spread of nuclear weapons, nuclear know-how 
and nuclear material has brought us to a nuclear tipping 
point. ...The steps we are taking now to address these 
 
threats are not adequate to the danger." 
Relevant to our deliberations here, this eminent group of 
Americans has suggested steps for the future. 
 
They have said we should: 
--strengthen the means of monitoring compliance with the NPT 
-- which could be achieved through requiring all NPT 
signatories to adopt monitoring provisions designed by the 
IAEA; 
--develop an international system to manage the nuclear fuel 
cycle -- given the growing interest in nuclear energy; and 
--adopt a process to bring the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban 
Treaty into force. 
 
It is time for a new approach - of which the revitalisation 
of the NPT and the IAEA is a critical part. 
 
End excerpt. 
 
MCCALLUM