Time to strengthen the International Atomic Energy Agency

But it’s not just about money. The report calls for a reinforced global nuclear order, involving increased collective action, more transparency, tougher safety and security standards and new non-proliferation measures.

The IAEA’s authority to go after possible nuclear proliferators needs to be strengthened. Its inspectors should be given more powers to follow up suspected nuclear weaponisation activities. As has become clear from recent events, sometimes transparency going well beyond the measures called for in the Additional Protocol is needed to provide confidence that a state’s nuclear program is entirely peaceful. The Additional Protocol of the Treaty on the Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) called for enhanced access and more intrusive inspections of countries’ nuclear programs in an effort to strengthen and expand verification and safeguards.

Although nuclear safety has improved enormously in recent decades, the risk of an accident at any given reactor must continue to be reduced. The IAEA’s role in persistently improving the global safety regime is critical and must be reinforced. Therefore, the agency should work with member states to co-ordinate research to design reactors that are economical, safe and proliferation-resistant.

It should be given a key role in managing new multinational mechanisms to assure supplies of nuclear fuel, at market prices, to countries with peaceful nuclear energy programs. This means that countries would not need to master the enrichment and reprocessing technology that would give them nuclear-weapons capability. It is one of the most promising non-proliferation avenues now being explored, by the US, Russia as well as other countries.

None of this will take place in a political vacuum. Article VI of the NPT legally obligates the nuclear-weapons state parties to negotiate in good faith toward nuclear disarmament, and at the 2000 NPT Review Conference, they agreed that the treaty represented an “unequivocal undertaking” to “accomplish the total elimination of their nuclear arsenals”. This commitment is an integral part of the NPT bargain.

World leaders need to make the reinvigoration of the nuclear non-proliferation regime a priority, with the nuclear-weapon states following up on their commitment to reduce and ultimately abolish their nuclear stockpiles. International nuclear verification will be essential as disarmament proceeds and the IAEA is uniquely suited to playing a central role. The agency should be tasked with monitoring the huge stockpiles of fissile material that will be released from nuclear-weapons programs.

What is needed is an ambitious reinvigoration of the grand bargain that was struck 40 years ago in the NPT. The renewed grand bargain will need to combine steps that can be taken immediately with a vision for the longer term, and to draw in states that are not parties to the NPT.

The international community has unprecedented opportunities and significant challenges to tackle as the world moves into its seventh nuclear decade. Whether or not the much-heralded “nuclear renaissance” materialises, the use of nuclear technologies throughout the world is certain to increase. They offer immense potential benefits to humankind, but also pose complex and wide-ranging safety and security challenges. Reinforcing the IAEA is a vital first step towards meeting those challenges.