Azerbaijan, Baku, Oct. 12 / Trend , G.Dadashova /
Georgia's Ambassador to the UN Alexander Lomaia has stated that the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) lacked some significant elements to provide a comprehensive response to all current challenges, the UN News Center reported.
He said the document lacks issue of the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), negotiations on fissile material and on negative security assurances.
"Unfortunately, if the current stalemate in the Conference on Disarmament was not overcome, then confidence in that body would dwindle fast. The First Committee should seriously consider how the work of the Conference should be pursued," he said at the 9th meeting of the First Committee of the 66th UN General Assembly on Oct.11.
Turning to conventional weapons, Lomaia said the flow of illicit small arms and light weapons remained one of the most challenging security items on the international agenda. An arms trade treaty would be an effective instrument in the non-proliferation of conventional arms, and measures to prevent trafficking in those weapons could be effective when coupled with rigorous transfer controls on the legal arms trade.
Lomaia said new threats, including cyber-attacks, had emerged and were evolving rapidly. The United Nations and the First Committee should contribute to scrutinizing the problem and raising awareness and understanding of that challenge, by providing an essential platform for elaborating mechanisms and instruments aimed at diffusing that threat.
"Nuclear smuggling on the occupied Georgian territories of Abkhazia and Tskhinvali region and South Ossetia further amplified a sense of danger. In the absence of an international presence, those occupied territories had become completely "opaque"," he said.
Georgia was deeply troubled that some countries continued to stand in the way of any real progress on international non-proliferation, arms control and disarmament efforts, he said.
Military actions were launched in the Georgian territory, South Ossetia on Aug.8 in 2008. Later the Russian troops occupied the Tskhinvali city and drove the Georgian military back. Russia recognized the independence of Abkhazia and South Ossetia in late August. In response, Tbilisi broke off diplomatic relations with Moscow and announced two unrecognized republics as the occupied territories.