International Nuclear Safeguards Strengthened

16 May 1997 

FACT SHEET ON INTERNATIONAL NUCLEAR SAFEGUARDS STRENGTHENED 
NORTHEAST ASIA PEACE AND SECURITY NETWORK 
    *****   SPECIAL REPORT   *****

The following is a White House Fact Sheet dated May 16, 1997, on a major 
step which the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and its member 
states took in tracking the location and use of nuclear materials 
worldwide.

 
*******


(White House Fact Sheet of May 16 on IAEA major step) (820)

THE WHITE HOUSE

May 16,1997

FACT SHEET

International Nuclear Safeguards Strengthened

On May 15, the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) and its member 
states took a major step forward in tracking the location and use of 
nuclear materials worldwide by adopting new safeguards arrangements for 
strengthening the effectiveness and improving the efficiency of the 
safeguards system. These new arrangements address a priority goal of 
President Clinton to combat the threat of weapons of mass destruction by 
strengthening the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and giving the 
IAEA a stronger role and sharper tools for conducting worldwide 
inspections.

These new arrangements, in the form of a model protocol to safeguards 
agreements, represent the first major change of the IAEA safeguards 
system in 25 years, and identify new technologies and new methods to 
strengthen safeguards and improve efficiency. The model protocol 
requires states to provide additional information on nuclear and 
nuclear-related activities and gives the IAEA greater access to 
activities and locations to undercover clandestine nuclear programs.

For many years the IAEA, based in Vienna, has provided oversight of 
nuclear materials in peaceful nuclear programs worldwide. This system of 
verification and oversight is known as the international safeguards 
system, and has been expanded in scope and practice since it began in 
1959. While IAEA safeguards inspectors were given access to peaceful 
nuclear facilities identified by a state to the IAEA, the safeguards 
system was never designed or intended to detect secret or clandestine 
nuclear activities such as those undertaken by Iraq prior to the Persian 
Gulf War. When Iraq's pursuit of a major nuclear weapons development 
program was discovered in 1991, the IAEA and the world community quickly 
learned that new tools with sharper teeth were needed in order to guard 
against the threat of other secret nuclear weapons programs.

The new model protocol will give international nuclear inspectors far 
greater information about nuclear and nuclear-related activities in a 
state, and far greater access to nuclear and related facilitates in a 
state. The IAEA will also have access to other sites when suspicions 
arise. By accepting a new legally binding protocol, states will assume 
these new obligations and ensure far greater transparency for all of 
their nuclear activities, both declared and undeclared.

This action was the result of a four-year development effort that 
proceeded in two parts. Part I reemphasizes and focuses on measures 
under IAEA's existing legal authority to detect undeclared nuclear 
activities. It was approved by the IAEA Board of Governors in June 1995 
and is being implemented now. Part II, approved by the Board of 
Governors on May 15, consists of new safeguards measures which will 
significantly strengthen the IAEA's ability to detect clandestine 
nuclear activities in states with comprehensive safeguards agreements. 
The strengthened measures under Part II require states to make their 
nuclear programs more transparent by providing additional information 
and access.

Elements of Part I include:

-- taking environmental samples at locations to which the IAEA has 
access for design information verification or inspections. This will be 
a powerful tool for detecting the presence of undeclared activities at 
or near declared nuclear sites;

-- using no-notice inspections at the strategic points of all nuclear 
facilities. Such inspections will improve the verification of movement 
of declared materials and provide another means of detecting the 
presence of undeclared material;

-- confirming the agency's right of access to records of activities 
carried out before entry-into-force of a safeguards agreement to help 
ensure that all material has been properly declared; and

-- use of advanced technologies that can operate unattended to transmit 
information to Agency headquarters, considerably reducing the need for 
frequent and expensive inspector travel.

Elements of the Model Protocol under Part II include:

-- an "expanded declaration" to provide information on nuclear fuel 
cycle-related activities not involving nuclear material including 
nuclear research and development and non-nuclear activities that support 
the nuclear fuel cycle to give the IAEA a far better understanding of a 
state's nuclear program, its future direction, and the kinds of nuclear 
activities the program's infrastructure could support;

-- access to any place on the site of a nuclear facility, to any 
decommissioned facility, and to any other location where nuclear 
material is present; to the nuclear-related manufacturing and other 
locations identified by the state in its expanded declaration; and to 
other suspect locations identified by the IAEA; and

-- the use of environmental sampling as well as other measures at these 
locations.

The United States intends to accept the new measures in the protocol in 
their entirety except where they involve information or locations of 
direct national security significance to the United States. It is our 
intention to make the protocol legally binding, and we will seek 
legislation that may be needed to implement the protocol here.

(end text)



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