§ Mr. Deakinsasked the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what account his Department takes, in dealing with problems of verification of underground nuclear tests, of the agreement of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics to on-site monitoring.
§ Mr. RentonAs they stand at present, the qualified nature of such offers would not in our view provide adequate levels of verification for a comprehensive test ban treaty. In any case, a range of technical problems would still need resolution. We welcome signs from the Reykjavik meeting between President Reagan and Mr. Gorbachev that the Soviet Union is prepared seriously to address verification issues, in the context of ratification of the threshold test ban treaty and peaceful nuclear explosion treaty. But the questions raised by verification of a CTBT will be of a different order.