Nuclear Missiles (Hansard, 29 February 1988)

Dr. Thomas
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make it his policy at the NATO Ministers meeting on 2 and 3 March to raise the issue of the nuclear non-proliferation treaty article VI obligations of NATO member states in the context of the 1983 Montebello NATO agreement on nuclear force modernisation.

§ Mr. Eggar
No. The decisions taken at Montebello, including the agreement to remove 1,400 nuclear warheads from NATO's stockpile, are in keeping with NATO members' obligations under article VI of the non-proliferation treaty. The recent conclusion of the INF agreement and our commitment to a START treaty are further illustrations of NATO's desire to bring about reductions in the level of nuclear weapons. However, nothing in the non-proliferation treaty requires the nuclear weapons states to allow their existing nuclear weapons to decay into obsolescence.

Dr. Thomas
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make it his policy at the NATO Ministers meeting on 2 and 3 March to raise the issue of the re-use of nuclear materials, including plutonium and highly enriched uranium, from warheads dismantled under the intermediate nuclear forces agreement of December 1987, in support of future NATO nuclear weapon modernisation programmes.
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§ Mr. Eggar
The INF treaty does not provide for the elimination or dismantlement of warheads. Re-use of fissile material from such warheads is entirely a matter for the United States and Soviet Union, not one for the Alliance.

Dr. Thomas
To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs if he will make it his policy to raise at the NATO Ministers meeting on 2 and 3 March the implications for the continued adherence by NATO member states to the 1972 anti-ballistic missile treaty of United States research and development outside land-based laboratories of technologies in the strategic defence initiative star wars programme.

§ Mr. Eggar
No. The 1972 anti-ballistic missile treaty is a treaty between the United States and the Soviet Union only. The United States strategic defence initiative is aimed at conducting research which is permitted by the treaty. The Soviet Union is also conducting an extensive research programme into ballistic missile defence.