The U.S. Senate ratified a nuclear arms reduction pact with Russia on Wednesday by a strong bipartisan vote of 71 to 26, VOA reports. The New START treaty was one of the last measures approved during a busy post-election, end-of-year session.
Posts Tagged ‘treaty’
Obama: Russia treaty “national security imperative”
November 19th, 2010 |
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U.S. President Barack Obama is mounting an all-out push for U.S. Senate ratification of the New START nuclear treaty with Russia, VOA reports.
Obama called it crucial for U.S. national security as he summoned a bipartisan group of former White House officials to help efforts to gain ratification before the end of the year.
Serbia, Montenegro sign extradition treaty
October 30th, 2010 |
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Serbia and Montenegro have signed the Extradition Treaty.
Serbian Justice Minister Snežana Malović and Montenegrin Ambassador to Serbia Igor Jović signed the treaty last night in Belgrade.
“EU clears way for treaty change”
October 29th, 2010 |
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At a summit in Brussels, European Union leaders have adopted a plan to tighten budgetary discipline across the bloc, RFE/RL reports. European Union leaders early on October 29 cleared the way for changes to the bloc’s treaty just 11 months after it brought the current rules into force, diplomats said at a summit in Brussels.
The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty: Consensus costs
June 3rd, 2010 |
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Broad agreement, but little achieved in taming the menace of nuclear proliferation
THEY didn’t come to unseemly diplomatic blows. Perhaps they should have. After four weeks of haggling the 189 members of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) unanimously reaffirmed their support for the battered document at a five-yearly review that ended on May 28th. Even usually truculent Iran endorsed a lengthy declaration upholding the NPT’s goals: getting the nuclear powers to give up their bombs; preventing others from acquiring them; and promoting nuclear power for peaceful uses only. But the NPT’s problems are no closer to solution.
The drive for unanimity, after the 2005 review meeting ended in a bad-tempered stalemate, meant that Iran had a potentially consensus-blocking veto. It used it to escape all censure. Yet Iran has been a serial breaker of the treaty’s anti-nuclear rules. The UN Security Council has censured it repeatedly for violating nuclear safeguards and for refusing to halt its enrichment of uranium and other sins. …
Medvedev, Obama sign nuclear arms control treaty
April 8th, 2010 |
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U.S. President Barack Obama and his Russian counterpart Dmitri Medvedev signed a nuclear arms reduction pact in the Czech Republic on Thursday. The pact marks a thaw in relations between the former Cold War enemies and sets the tone for other countries with nuclear weapons or ambitions.
Logic v politics
April 8th, 2010 |
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Barack Obama and Dmitry Medvedev sign a new strategic arms-reduction treaty in Prague
HE HAD stopped over briefly in Prague for a handshake with Russia’s president, Dmitry Medvedev, on a new strategic arms-reduction treaty—and a new start also, it is hoped, in relations with America’s still prickly cold-war rival. And then Barack Obama was due back in Washington to play host to more than 40 heads of government for his own nuclear-security summit on April 12th and 13th. Mr Obama wants pledges from them to secure nuclear materials around the world and to crack down harder on illicit traffickers, ahead of next month’s five-yearly review of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, the world’s main bulwark against proliferation and nuclear terrorism.
Yet when it comes to recasting America’s own nuclear-weapons policy to deal more efficiently with the same threats, Mr Obama may have a battle ahead. In many ways, this week’s delayed nuclear posture review simply brings America’s official nuclear thinking into line with long-standing practice, including that of his more warlike predecessor, George Bush. With the demise of the old Soviet threat, nuclear weapons play a diminishing role in America’s defences. Like Mr Bush, Mr Obama plans instead to rely more on America’s array of powerful conventional weapons to deter future adversaries in a crisis. …
America, Russia and arms control: It takes two
March 31st, 2010 |
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Arms cuts get you only so far; a safer world needs tighter anti-proliferation rules too
WHEN Barack Obama promised, in Prague a year ago, to “seek the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons” and won a Nobel peace prize for it, even he felt that the accolade was a bit premature. His Prague to-do list was long: reduce the role of nuclear weapons in America’s defences; cut the number of nukes, too, in a bold new treaty with Russia; win Senate ratification of the test-ban treaty; seek a United Nations ban (or “cut-off”) on making fissile material for bombs; and meanwhile secure all nuclear materials from terrorist reach.
The real prize Mr Obama was after was international support for a stronger Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) at its upcoming five-yearly review in May. For North Korea, Iran and others have battered its anti-nuclear foundations. …
U.S., Russia to sign new arms pact April 8
March 27th, 2010 |
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The United States and Russia will sign a new treaty April 8 in Prague slashing their stockpiles of long-range nuclear weapons.
The new treaty will replace the START I agreement (Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty) signed in 1991 by U.S. President George Herbert Walker Bush and Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev. That treaty came into force in 1994 but expired December 5.
“U.S., Russia very close to nuclear treaty”
March 25th, 2010 |
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A White House official said Wednesday that the United States and Russia are “very close” to an agreement on a nuclear arms reduction treaty. The official says that when a signing ceremony is held, it will be in Prague.
Russia and U.S. on “brink†of arms reduction treaty
March 20th, 2010 |
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It was a time for tributes in Moscow, a pause in talks between the U.S. and Russia aimed at making progress in the strategic arms reduction treaty. Hillary Clinton laid a wreath at the tomb of the unknown soldier at the start of the second leg of her two-day visit to Moscow. The sombre mood turned to optimism after it was clear that the talks over START2, as the nuclear arms reduction treaty is known, were making progress. It was an optimistic Clinton who spoke to the press.
Mistaken airstrike kills 33 in Afghanistan
February 23rd, 2010 |
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A North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (Nato) airstrike in southern Afghanistan has killed 33 people after an aircraft fired on civilians mistakenly thought to be insurgents, the Afghan government said yesterday. The Afghan cabinet condemned the killings near the border of Uruzgan and Dai Kondi
Any Climate Treaty Which Does Not Dramatically Reduce Soot Is Not Worth the Paper It’s Written On
December 15th, 2009 |
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Preface: I studied global warming at a top university in the early 1980′s. I was taught – as Al Gore was taught in college – that temperatures are directly correlated with CO2 levels.This essay will not address the question of whether global temperatu…
New US-Russian nuclear missile treaty “close”
December 4th, 2009 |
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The Russian foreign ministry says it is close to agreement with U.S. negotiators on a successor to a Cold War-era treaty to cut nuclear weapons. The ministry’s statement came hours before the expiry of the Start I Treaty, signed in 1991.
Lisbon Treaty opens new EU chapter
December 1st, 2009 |
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Years in the making, the often controversial Lisbon reform treaty comes into force today. It’s aiming to boost the European Union on the world stage by increasing the power of the European Parliament and making EU decisions less unwieldy.
Secret IP Treaty Proposal Rubs Tech Wrong
November 6th, 2009 |
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The negotiations over the International Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement that concluded another round this week in Seoul, South Korea, prompts watchdog groups to complain to President Obama about Hollywood’s influence over the talks and the lack of transparency surrounding the entire negotiations.
– Civilian libertarians, Internet privacy watchdog groups and libraries are
irate over the secret negotiations in Seoul, South
Korea, involving ACTA (International
Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement). The negotiations, they claim, heavily
favor Hollywood interests pushing tougher international
c…
Czech court clears Lisbon Treaty
November 3rd, 2009 |
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The Czech constitutional court has ruled that the Lisbon Treaty is in line with the constitution, clearing the way for President Vaclav Klaus to sign it. The Czech Republic is the only EU member yet to ratify the treaty, and the decision removes the penultimate hurdle to its passage.
Klaus wins Lisbon Treaty concession
October 30th, 2009 |
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Vaclav Klaus, the Czech Republic President, has won the concession he demanded before he would put his crowning signature on the deed. He felt the Lisbon Treaty would infringe on EU member states’ sovereignty, EuroNews reported.
Climate, Czech treaty talks to top EU summit
October 29th, 2009 |
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European leaders begin a two-day summit in Brussels today in an effort to prepare for the Copenhagen climate talks in December. They will discuss that and steering the bloc’s economies out of recession.