A Growing Divide on Nuclear Nonproliferation

New York and Washington may be separated by only a few hundred miles, but in the last few weeks, they have appeared to be light years apart on arms control and nonproliferation issues.

In New York, representatives of more than 100 countries worked from May 4-15 to prepare for next year's nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty review conference. Buoyed by U.S. President Barack Obama's April pledge to seek a world free from nuclear weapons, their work was marked by a spirit of cooperation and compromise that had been noticeably absent during the eight years of the Bush administration. They approved an agenda for next year's event in record time and contemplated forwarding an ambitious set of recommendations to the conference. They welcomed the reinvigoration of U.S-Russian strategic arms talks and Obama's commitment to again seek ratification of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) prohibiting nuclear weapon tests. ...