Speech upon Signing the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

Per Point 75, Prot. No. 87^[1]

Attachment No. 1

Speech

upon Signing the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons

Comrades! Citizens!

Permit me on instructions of the Soviet government to express deep satisfaction that today begins the signing of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons – this important international document approved by the overwhelming majority of UN members. The conclusion of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation is a huge success for the benefit of peace. From the moment nuclear weapons appeared, the Soviet Union strongly and repeatedly spoke out on the need to avert the nuclear threat to mankind. The treaty is an important step towards this goal, since it places a barrier to the further proliferation of nuclear weapons and reduces at the same time the danger of nuclear war being unleashed.

The participation of a wide circle of states in signing the Treaty today convincingly speaks to the fact that states can find mutually acceptable solutions to complex international problems which are vitally important for all of mankind. Working out the Treaty required sizeable effort and long negotiations in which countries took part, both nuclear and non-nuclear, big and small, developed and developing, countries belonging to different social systems. It can be said that the Treaty is a valuable alloy of wishes and proposals, taking into account varying points of view on solving the problem of non-proliferation, and this allows for the hope that the alloy will be durable and reliable.

An important addition to the Treaty is the decision on safeguards for the non-nuclear country-members of the Treaty, accepted the other day by the Security Council. The Soviet government, as was declared at the Security Council, intends to rigorously carry out this decision.

Five years ago here in Moscow we signed the Treaty on banning nuclear tests in three environments [the Limited Test Ban Treaty]. Then, a Treaty was concluded banning the use of space for military purposes. Together with the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, all these are practical steps towards limiting the arms race and will create more favorable conditions to movement forward in the area of disarmament.

Attaching great importance to the provisions of the Treaty on Non-Proliferation and since the obligation to, in the spirit of good will, conduct negotiations on effective measures to halt the nuclear arms race and for disarmament has been placed on participants, the Soviet government had made the decision to send all governments a Memorandum on some urgent measures to halt the nuclear arms race and for disarmament, including such measures as a ban on the use of nuclear weapons, a halt to the production of nuclear weapons, reduction and elimination of stockpiles, and limiting and subsequently reducing delivery systems for strategic and other weapons. A simultaneous or staged implementation of the measures on disarmament proposed by the Soviet government is a serious contribution to the struggle to halt the arms race and for a cardinal solution to the problem of disarmament.

Permit me to express the hope that the Memorandum will be considered with due attention by the governments of the world’s states and that it will be the subject of an all-round discussion in the Eighteen-Nation Disarmament Committee which will renew its work in the near future and that as a result of this it will be possible to achieve concrete results in the area of disarmament.

-ev

ob, vd

^[1] Translator’s Note: The following information is extracted from Protocol No. 87 of the CPSU CC Politburo meeting, finalized on 2 July 1968 and covering numerous resolutions made during 21 June to 2 July 1968. A number of decisions were made during the meeting, including Point 75