Hostname: page-component-55f67697df-bzg56 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-05-11T07:28:46.070Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Path Not Taken, The Way Still Open: Denuclearizing The Korean Peninsula And Northeast Asia

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  07 May 2025

Michael Hamel-Green  and
Peter Hayes
Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

A Korean Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (WFZ) may be a necessary condition to achieving the full denuclearization of Korea. As well as providing benefits to the United States in preventing a major direct and wider proliferation threat from North Korea, and to China, Japan and South Korea in maintaining stability in the Northeast Asian Region, it would also serve to address North Korean security concerns about potential US nuclear strikes. The two Koreas have already negotiated a legal basis for a Korean Nuclear Weapon Free Zone in the form of the 1992 Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korea Peninsula. This could form the basis of a NWFZ covering the peninsula. Alternatively, the ROK and Japan could create a Japan Korea NWFZ via a bilateral treaty. This article assesses the prospects for the creation of a NWFZ in the present international climate.

Type
Research Article
Information
Asia-Pacific Journal , Volume 7 , Issue 50 , December 2009 , e1
Creative Commons
Creative Common License - CCCreative Common License - BYCreative Common License - NCCreative Common License - ND
This is an Open Access article, distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivatives licence (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is unaltered and is properly cited. The written permission of Cambridge University Press must be obtained for commercial re-use or in order to create a derivative work.
Copyright
Copyright © The Authors 2009

References

Notes

1 See Hayes, Peter. Global Insecurity And Nuclear Next-Use, NAPSNet Special Report, November 5, 2008.

2 Westberg, Gunnar, “Climate Consequences of a Regional Nuclear War”, paper presented at Conference on an Arctic Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone, Copenhagen, 10-11 August 2009, Danish Institute for International Studies/Danish and Canadian Pugwash, IPPNW (Sweden) and International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms, p.2.

3 Ibid., p.2-3. Studies cited by Westberg include: Robock, Alan, et al., “Nuclear winter revisited with a modern climate model and current nuclear arsenals: still catastrophic consequences”, Journal of Geophysical Research, 112, D13107, doi:2006JD008235, 2007; Helfand, Ira, “An Assessment of the Extant of Projected Global Famine Resulting from Limited, Regional Nuclear War”, Royal Society of Medicine, London, October 3 2007, available here; and Mills, Michael J. et al., “Massive global ozone loss predicted following regional nuclear conflict”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, 105, 2007, 5307-5312.

4 Westberg, op.cit. Note that Des Ball has published a critique of these claims: Desmond Ball, ‘The Probabilities of “On the Beach”: assessing “Armageddon Scenarios” in the 21st Century’, SDSC WorkingPaper # 401, Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, Australian National University, 2006.

5 See. Quester, G. Nuclear First Strike, Consequences of a Broken Taboo, John Hopkins University Press, 2006.

6 Cirincione, Joseph, Wolfsthal, Jon B. and Rakjuma, Miriam, Deadly Arsenals: Nuclear, Biological and Chemical Threats, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington D.C, Second Edition, 2005, p.284. Cirincione et.al. note further that if its planned nuclear reactor, fuel-fabrication and reprocessing facilities are implemented, it would be able to “produce 275 kilograms of plutonium a year, enough for 50 weapons annually” (p.284).

7 See KCNA, “DPRK Permanent Representative Sends Letter to President of UNSC,” September 4, 2009, here; Choe, S.H and D. Sanger, “North Korea Reveals Second Path to Nuclear Bomb,” New York Times, September 5, 2009, here.

8 Hayes, Peter, “North Korean proliferation and the end of US nuclear hegemony,” in S. Lodgaard et al, edited, Nuclear Proliferation and International Security, Routledge, 2007, pp. 118-136.

9 Of course, many cities and local regions have unilaterally enacted nuclear free zones, but these are not legally binding commitments on states that control nuclear weapons, although these local and sometimes trans-governmental efforts may play a role in mobilizing public attitudes that influence national and foreign policy actor orientations in states negotiating NWFZs.

10 Goldblat, Jozef, Arms Control: The New Guide to Negotiations and Agreements, (London: SAGE,/PRIO/SIPRI, 2002) second edition, pp.190-219.

11 As Joseph Johnson, President of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, noted in his preface to an account of the negotiations of the Tlatelolco Treaty by its principal architect, Alfonso Garcia Robles: “The Cuban crisis of October 1962 suddenly and dramatically confronted the states of Latin America with the fact that their area of the world had become involved in the strategic plans and rivalries of the nuclear powers. Men of vision in the area turned their thoughts to ways of avoiding any possibility of a recurrence of the Cuban experience in some other country of Latin America. They also wished to preclude even the relatively remote possibility of a nuclear arms race among the countries of their area” (Robles, Alfonso Garcia, The Denuclearization of Latin America, Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, Washington DC, 1967, p.xiii).

12 For a detailed discussion of the changing stances of Brazil and Argentina, and the role of the Tlatelolco Treaty, see Mitchell Reiss, Bridled Ambition: Why Countries Constrain Their Nuclear Capabilities, (Washington D.C.: Woodrow Wilson Centre Press/John Hopkins University Press, 1995), 64-66.

13 On the South Pacific NWFZ, see Hamel-Green, Michael, The South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty: A Critical Assessment, Peace Research Centre, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University, 1990, p.1; on the African NWFZ, see Adeniji, Oluyemi, The Treaty of Pelindaba on the African Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone, United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, Geneva, 2002, pp.36-37.

14 Roscini, Marco, ‘Something Old, Something New: The 2006 Semipalatinsk Treaty on a Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone in Central Asia’, Chinese Journal of International Law 7, no.3 (2008), 593–624.

15 Beck, Peter, The International Politics of Antarctica, Croom Helm, Beckenham, 1986 (especially chapter 4 ‘A Continent for Peace‘).

16 Bilveer Singh, ASEAN, the Southeast Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free-Zone and the Challenge of Denuclearization in Southeast Asia: Problems and Prospects, (Canberra: Strategic and Defence Studies Centre, ANU, 2000), 41-44; Subedi, Surya P., “Problems and Prospects for the Treaty on the Creation of a Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone in Southeast Asia”, International Journal of Peace Studies, 4, 1, January 1999; and Hamzah, B.A. (ed.), The Southeast Asian Zone of Peace, Freedom and Neutrality (ZOPFAN): Revisited, Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Kuala Lumpur, 1991.

17 Roscine, op.cit

18 A recent discussion of nuclear weapon state approaches may be found in Hamel-Green, Michael, “Nuclear-Weapon-Free-Zone initiatives: challenges and opportunities for regional cooperation on non-proliferation”, Global Change, Peace and Security, 21 3 October 2009. Note that there are other treaties that may ban the use of nuclear weapons in a particular territory (such as Antarctica, outer space, Mongolia, the seabed, etc, but these are not NWFZs in form or in many respects, substance.

19 Dobbs, Michael, One Minute to Midnight: Kennedy, Khrushchev, and Castro on the Brink of Nuclear War, Knopf/Random House, New York, 2008.

20 For detailed studies of the Antarctic Treaty System, see: Beck, Peter, The International Politics of Antarctica, Croom Helm, Beckenham, 1986 (especially chapter 4 ‘A Continent for Peace‘); Francioni, Francesco and Scovazzi, Tullio, International Law for Antarctica, Kluwer Law International, The Hague, 1996; Jorgensen-Dahl, Arnfinn and Ostreng, Willy (eds.), The Antarctic Treaty System in World Politics, Macmillan/Frijtjof Nansen Institute, London, 1991; Rothwell, Donald, The Polar Regions and the Development of International Law, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1996; and Stokke, Olav Schram and Vidas, Davor (eds.), Governing the Antarctic: the effectiveness and legitimacy of the Antarctic Treaty System, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1996.

21 See for example: League of Arab States and UNIDIR 2003 Conference on “Building a Weapons of Mass Destruction Free Zone in the Middle East” in UNIDIR, Building a Weapons of Mass Destruction Free Zone in the Middle East: Global Non-Proliferation Regimes and Regional Experiences, (Geneva: UNIDIR, 2004); and Prawitz, Jan and Leonard, James, F., A Zone Free of Weapons of Mass Destruction in the Far East, United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research, Geneva, 1996.

22 For a discussion of early proposals for Northeast Asian and Korean NWFZ see: Koo, Bon-Hak, “A Northeast Asian Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone: A Korean Perspective” in Thakur, Ramesh (ed.,), Nuclear Weapons-Free Zones, Macmillan/St Martin's Press, London, 1998, pp.129-130.

23 Colm, Peter W., Hayes, Rosemary, Spielmann, Karl F. & White, Nathan N., “The Reduction of Tension in Korea”, Institute for Defense Analyses, Technical Report (Secret) prepared for the US Arms Control and Disarmament Agency, distributed by the Defense Logistics Agency, Arlington, Virginia, Vols. 1 and 2, June 1972. [Declassified 1977].

24 Ibid., Vol.1, p.19.

25 Ibid., p.23.

26 Ibid., Vol.2, p.114 and p.127.

27 Koo, op.cit., p.131.

28 Ibid.

29 Kim, Samuel S., The Two Koreas and the Great Powers, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 2006, pp.118-119; Koo, Bon-Hak, “A Northeast Asian NWFZ: A Korean Perspective” in Thakur, Ramesh, (ed.), Nuclear Weapons-Free Zones, Macmillan/St Martin's Press, 1998, p.130; Shim, Jae-Kwon, A Korean Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone: A Perspective, Peace Research Centre, Australian National University, Research School of Pacific Studies, Working Paper No.110, Canberra, 1991, p.10.

30 Koo, Bon-Hak, Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone In Northeast Asia: A South Korean Perspective, paper prepared for the Northeast Asia Peace and Security Network, Nautilus Institute for Security and Sustainable Development, June 1994.

31 Ibid.

32 Goldblat, Jozef, Arms Control: The New Guide to Negotiations and Agreements, PRIO/SIPRI/Sage, London, 2003. [Part II Agreements and Parties, CD ROM section, 1992]

33 Ibid.

34 Ibid.

35 Hayes, Peter, “The Republic of Korea and the Nuclear Issue” in Mack, Andrew (ed.), Asian Flashpoint, Allen & Unwin, St Leonards, NSW, 1993, p.52.

36 Hayes, Peter, et al, “South Korea's Nuclear Surprise,” Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, V.61 1, Jan-Feb 2005.

37 Mack, Andrew, “A Northeast Asia Nuclear-Free Zone: Problems and Prospects” in Mack, Andrew (ed.), Nuclear Policies in Northeast Asia, UNIDIR, Geneva, 1995, p.116.

38 Chinoy, Mike, Meltdown: The Inside Story of the North Korean Nuclear Crisis, St Martin's Press, New York, 2008, pp.7-8.

39 Ibid., pp.43-80.

40 Ibid., pp.103-126.

41 Solingen, Etel, Nuclear Logics: Contrasting Paths in East Asia and the Middle East. Princeton University Press, Princeton, 2007, p.123; Chinoy, op.cit., pp.103-174.

42 Chinoy, op.cit., pp.175-365. Chinoy provides a detailed account of the talks based on interviews with US Bush Administration officials and negotiators from their start to early 2008. A revealing comment was that the main US negotiator, Christopher Hill, reportedly complained to friends that “negotiating with the North Koreans was often less fraught than dealing with the hard-liners in Vice President Cheney's office and elsewhere in the administration” (p.363).

43 United States Department of State, Office of the Spokesman, “Joint Statement of the Fourth Round of the Six-Party Talks”, Washington DC, 19 September 2005; Kile, Shannon, “Nuclear Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, SIPRI Yearbook 2008, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2008, pp.350-356.

44 Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Initial Actions for the Implementation of the Joint Statement”, 13 February 2007; Kile, op.cit.

45 US Department of State, “Update on the Six-Party Talks”, Fact Sheet, 10 May 2008.

46 Kile, Shannon, “Nuclear Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, SIPRI Yearbook 2009, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2009, pp.397-402.

47 Snyder, Scott, “What's Driving Pyongyang?”, Nautilus Institute Policy Forum Online, 09-055A, July 7 2009.

48 KBS World, “‘Comprehensive Package’ on N.Korea and ‘Denuclearization and Openness 3000‘”, 21 August 2009.

49 For a discussion of the early proposals of Maeda, Hayasi, Whiting, Allen, Cunningham, William and Halperin, Morton see Koo, Bon-Hak, “A Northeast Asian NWFZ: A Korean Perspective” in Thakur, Ramesh (ed.), Nuclear Weapons-Free Zones, Macmillan/St Martin's Press, London, 1998, pp.131-132.

50 Hayes, Peter, Zarsky, Lyuba and Bello, Walden, American Lake: Nuclear Peril in the Pacific, Penguin Books, Ringwood, Victoria, 1986, pp.395-398.

51 Endicott, John and Gorowitz, “Track-II Cooperative Regional Security Efforts: Lessons from the Limited-Nuclear-Weapons-Free Zone for Northeast Asia”, Pacifica Review, 11, 3, 1999, pp.3293-3324; Endicott, John, “Limited Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones: The Time Has Come”, Korean Journal of Defense Analysis, vol.20, no.1, March 2008, pp.13-26; also see this website for further details of this initiative.

52 Shim, Jae-Kwon, A Korean Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone: A Perspective, Peace Research Centre, Research School of Pacific Studies, Australian National University, Working Paper No.110, Canberra, 1991.

53 Mack, Andrew, “A Northeast Asia Nuclear-Free Zone: Problems and Prospects” in Mack, Andrew (ed.), Nuclear Policies in Northeast Asia, UNDIIR, Geneva, 1995, pp.97-126.

54 Kaneko, Kumao “Circular NWFZ”, 2005; Kaneko, Kumao “Japan Needs No Umbrella,” Bulletin of Atomic Scientists, March/April 1996.

55 Koo, Bon-Hak, “A Northeast Asian Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone: A Korean Perspective” in Thakur, Ramesh (ed.), Nuclear Weapons-Free Zones, Macmillan/St Martin's Press, London, 1998, pp.123-151.

56 Xia, Liping. “Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zones: Lessons for Nonproliferation in Northeast Asia.” Nonproliferation Review 6, Fall 1999.

57 Suzuki, Tatsujiro, A Proposal for Tripartite Nuclear Weapon Free Zone in Korea and Japan: Possible Alternative for TMD? Tokyo, 2000.

58 Umebayashi, Hiromichi, “Proposal of a Model Northeast Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone Treaty”, paper presented at Workshop on Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone and Missile Control in Northeast Asia, Fudan University, Shanghai, China, July 16-18, 2004; Umebayashi, Hiromichi, “Towards a Northeast Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone”, Japan Focus, August 11 2005.

59 Peace Depot, A Model Treaty on the Northeast Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone, Peace Depot, Yokohama, November 2005.

60 Hayes, Peter, A Sustainable Korean Nuclear Weapons Free Zone Concept, 2010, presentation to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Norway Meeting on Nuclear Disarmament and Non-Proliferation, Washington DC, 17 December 2008.

61 Asahi Shimbun, “64 Years and Counting”, editorial, 20 August 2009, reprinted here.

62 Umebayashi, Hiromichi, “Proposal of a Model Northeast Asia Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone Treaty”, paper presented at Workshop on Nuclear-Weapon-Free Zone and Missile Control in Northeast Asia, Fudan University, Shanghai, China, July 16-18, 2004.

63 Asahi Shimbun, “64 Years and Counting”, editorial, 20 August 2009, reprinted here.

64 White, Hugh and Wainwright, Elsina, Danger and Opportunity: Australia and the North Korea Crisis, Australian Strategic Policy Institute, Canberra, 2003. Pp.34-35.

65 Nodong Sinmun, Pyongyang, 25 June 2009.

66 These perceptions were reiterated in meetings between US and DPRK security analysts at a track two meeting in San Diego; See D. Zagoria, “U.S.-DPRK Relations at a Crossroads: Danger of Drift,” Summary Record of a Conference Organized by the National Committee on American Foreign Policy (NCAFP) and The Korea Society, October 30, 2009, unpublished record.