General Assembly

Distr. GENERAL  

4 December 1990

ORIGINAL:
ENGLISH

                                                        A/RES/45/51
                                                        54th plenary meeting
                                                        4 December 1990
 
           Urgent need for a comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty
 
      The General Assembly,
 
      Convinced that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought,
 
      Convinced also of the consequent urgent need for an end to the
 nuclear-arms race and the immediate and verifiable reduction and ultimate
 elimination of nuclear weapons,
 
      Convinced further that an end to nuclear testing by all States in all
 environments for all time is an essential step in order to prevent the
 qualitative improvement and development of nuclear weapons and their further
 proliferation and to contribute, along with other concurrent efforts to reduce
 nuclear arms, to the eventual elimination of nuclear weapons,
 
      Noting concerns expressed about the environmental and health risks
 associated with underground nuclear testing,
 
      Recognizing the agreement on and signature of, in Washington on
 1 June 1990, the verification protocols to the Treaty between the United
 States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the
 Limitation of Underground Nuclear Weapon Tests,  signed on 3 July 1974, and
 to the Treaty between the United States of America and the Union of Soviet
 Socialist Republics on Underground Nuclear Explosions for Peaceful
 Purposes, signed on 28 May 1976, and looking forward to the conclusion of
 all ratification processes,
 
      Welcoming the ongoing implementation of the Treaty between the United
 States of America and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics on the
 Elimination of Their Intermediate-Range and Shorter-Range Missiles and the
 agreement in principle on and further progress made towards a first treaty on
 significant reductions in their strategic nuclear forces, and urging the
 earliest possible conclusion of such a treaty,
 
      Recalling the final document on international security and disarmament
 adopted by the Ninth Conference of Heads of State or Government of Non-Aligned
 Countries, held at Belgrade from 4 to 7 September 1989,
 
      Recalling also the proposals by the leaders of the Six-Nation
 Initiative to promote an end to nuclear testing,
 
      Convinced that the most effective way to achieve the discontinuance of
 all nuclear tests by all States in all environments for all time is through
 the conclusion, at an early date, of a verifiable, comprehensive
 nuclear-test-ban treaty that will attract the adherence of all States,
 
      Reaffirming the particular responsibilities of the Conference on
 Disarmament in the negotiation of a comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty, and
 in this context welcoming the re-establishment of the Ad Hoc Committee on a
 Nuclear Test Ban in the Conference on Disarmament,
 
      Taking note of the work being undertaken within the Conference on
 Disarmament by the Ad Hoc Group of Scientific Experts to Consider
 International Co-operative Measures to Detect and Identify Seismic Events and
 the conduct of the second technical test concerning the global exchange and
 analysis of seismic data,
 
      Noting that the Amendment Conference of States Parties to the Treaty
 Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space and under Water
 will be held in January 1991 to consider an amendment to extend the scope of
 the Treaty to include underground nuclear testing,
 
      1.   Reaffirms its conviction that a treaty to achieve the prohibition of
 all nuclear-test explosions by all States in all environments for all time is
 a matter of fundamental importance;
 
      2.   Urges the Conference on Disarmament, in order that a comprehensive
 nuclear-test-ban treaty may be concluded at an early date, to re-establish the
 Ad Hoc Committee on a Nuclear Test Ban at the beginning of its 1991 session to
 carry forward the work begun in the Conference in 1990, focusing on
 substantive work on specific and interrelated test-ban issues, including
 structure and scope as well as verification and compliance;
 
      3.   Also urges the Conference on Disarmament:
 
      (a)  To take into account, in this context, the progress achieved by the
 Ad Hoc Group of Scientific Experts to Consider International Co-operative
 Measures to Detect and Identify Seismic Events, including work on the routine
 exchange and use of wave-form data, and other relevant initiatives or
 experiments by individual States and groups of States;
 
      (b)  To encourage the widest possible participation by States in the
 technical test that is now under way concerning the global exchange and
 analysis of seismic data;
 
      (c)  To take immediate steps for the establishment, with the widest
 possible participation, of an international seismic monitoring network with a
 view to developing further a system for the effective monitoring and
 verification of compliance with a comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty;
 
      (d)  To initiate detailed investigation of other measures to monitor and
 verify compliance with such a treaty, including on-site inspections and an
 international network to monitor atmospheric radioactivity;
 
      4.   Urges:
 
      (a)  The nuclear-weapon States, especially those which possess the most
 important nuclear arsenals, to agree promptly to appropriate verifiable and
 militarily significant interim measures, with a view to concluding a
 comprehensive nuclear-test-ban treaty;
 
      (b)  Those nuclear-weapon States which have not yet done so to adhere to
 the Treaty Banning Nuclear Weapon Tests in the Atmosphere, in Outer Space and
 under Water;
 
      5.   Calls upon the Conference on Disarmament to report to the General
 Assembly at its forty-sixth session on progress made;
 
      6.   Decides to include in the provisional agenda of its forty-sixth
 session the item entitled "Urgent need for a comprehensive nuclear-test-ban
 treaty".