1985 Conference on Disarmament concludes.

1985 Conference on Disarmament concludes Progress made on chemical weapons, outer space issues

Proposals to ban strike weapons in outer space and to launch a programme of international co-operation in peaceful space exploration were put before the Conference on Disarmament at its 1985 session. Also, for the first time, the Conference established a subsidiary body on the prevention of the arms race in outer space.

During the second half of its two-part session (5 February-23 April, 11 June-30 August) in Geneva, the 40-member Conference arrived at "preliminary formulations' to be used as a basis for further elaboration of a chemical weapons convention. Stanislas Turbanski (Poland), Chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee on Chemical Weapons, said that negotiations on the text, although "slow and arduous', were progressing "systematically and distinguishably'.

Despite widespread agreement on the importance of a comprehensive nuclear test ban treaty, the Conference was again unable to establish an ad hoc committee on the subject. It also failed to establish subsidiary bodies on agenda items dealing with the prevention of nuclear war and with cessation of the nuclear arms race and nuclear disarmament.

The Conference did establish bodies to continue work on a comprehensive programme of disarmament, on a draft convention against radiological weapons, and on effective international arrangements to assure nonnuclear-weapon States against the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons. (For a report on the first part of the 1985 session, see UN Chronicle, 1985, No. 5.)

The Conference also considered measures to improve its functioning and reaffirmed its decision to increase its membership by not more than four States. Two candidates were to be nominated by the Group of 21 neutral and non-aligned States, one by the socialist Group and one by the Western Group. Requests for membership have been received from Norway, Finland, Austria, Turkey, Senegal, Bangladesh, Spain, Viet Nam, Ireland, Tunisia, Ecuador, Cameroon and Greece.

Conference membership now consists of the five nuclear-weapon States (China, France, Soviet Union, United Kingdom and United States) and the following 35 countries: Algeria, Argentina, Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Burma, Canada, Cuba, Czechoslovakia, Egypt, Ethiopia, German Democratic Republic, Federal Republic of Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Iran, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Mexico, Mongolia, Morocco, Netherlands, Nigeria, Pakistan, Peru, Poland, Romaina, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Venezuela, Yugoslavia and Zaire.

Outer space: The Ad Hoc Committee on the Prevention of an Arms Race in Outer Space, which began work on 20 June under the chairmanship of Saad Alfarargi (Egypt), was set up on 29 March to "examine, as a first step at this atage, through substantive and general consideration, issues relevant to the prevention of an arms race in outer space'. This body also was to deal with existing issues and agreements relevant to the prevention of an arms race in outer space, and with proposals and future initiatives in that regard.

The Ad Hoc Committee reported (CD/641) there was widespread concern at what was seen as the "extensive use' of outer space for military purposes. A number of delegations said the majority of space objects now in orbit, although not meant as weapons or weapons platforms, served military functions and constituted integral parts of weapons systems on earth.

Socialist States said the threat that the arms race would spread to outer space stemmed from the "Strategic Defence Initiative'--the United States' "Star Wars' programme--which in their view was not a research programme as claimed but a programme to develop and deploy a new class of armaments, attack space weapons.

The United States reiterated that its Strategic Defence Initiative was only a research programme to explore technologies that might someday be useful in providing a defence against nuclear ballistic missile attacks, and was consistent with all international obligations to which the United States adhered.

India emphasized that the nonaligned and neutral States had consistently opposed the development of space weapons systems by any Government. As its Prime Minister, Rajiv Gandhi, had said: "When we criticize "Star Wars' and the Strategic ?? Initiative, it is equal for everyone, it is not just for the United States of America. We criticize it if the Europeans are doing it, or . . . the Soviet Union . . . or anybody else.'

"An arms race in outer space will undermine the prospects for arms limitation and reduction as a whole', said Mongolia, in introducing a proposal (CD/607) submitted by a group of socialist countries for an agreement prohibiting and eliminating strike weapons of any kind in space-- whether manned or unmanned, conventional, nuclear, laser or...