NSG_OSL/press/final

The fifteenth Plenary Meeting of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) took place in Oslo, Norway on the 23-24 ^th> of June 2005. Ms. Sylvi Graham, Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs, made a welcoming opening statement on behalf of the Norwegian Government. The meeting was chaired by Ambassador Roald Næss, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Oslo.

Croatia was approved by the Plenary as the 45 ^th> Participating Government to the NSG.

The NSG took stock of developments since the last Plenary Meeting in Gőteborg, Sweden, in May 2004. In doing so the NSG:

• Reiterated firm support for the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and, while noting that the 2005 Review Conference did not reach a substantive outcome, affirmed the NSGs continued determination to strengthen the non-proliferation regime in the face of some new challenges;
• Exchanged information and analysed the current proliferation challenges namely the Democratic Peoples Republic of Korea and Iran cases;
• Called on all states to exercise extreme vigilance and make best efforts to ensure that none of their exports of goods and technologies contribute to nuclear weapons programmes;
• Welcomed the adoption of UNSC Resolution 1540 and stated its readiness to co-operate in the ongoing process of fully implementing this resolution, regarding inter alia national export controls;
• Noted with pleasure that the recognition of NSG control measures as an international benchmark has grown over the last year. Participants welcome in this regard announcements by non participating governments to adhere to the NSG guidelines, as a positive expression of implementation of internationally agreed export control guidelines.

In order to strengthen further the Participating Governments’ national export controls, the NSG decided to adopt, inter alia, the following measures:

• The establishment of a procedure towards suspending through national decisions nuclear transfers to countries that are non-compliant with their safeguards agreements;
• The supplier and the recipient states should elaborate appropriate measures to envoke fall-back safeguards if the IAEA can no longer undertake its Safeguard mandate in a recipient state;
• To introduce the existence of effective export controls in the recipient state as a criterion of supply for nuclear material, equipment and technology and a factor for consideration for dual use items and technologies.

The Participating Governments agreed to continue to enhance information exchange in all aspects.

The Participating Governments also agreed to continue, as a matter of priority:

• Discussions of the Additional Protocol as a condition of supply
• Discussions with a view to agree on further strengthening of the NSG guidelines with respect to enrichment and reprocessing technologies.

The Participating Governments furthermore agreed to continue contact with non-participants in the framework of the NSG outreach programme.

The aim of the NSG, which has currently 44 Participating Governments 1Participating Governments of the Nuclear Suppliers Group are:<br >Argentina, Australia, Austria, Belarus, Belgium, Brazil, Bulgaria, Canada, the People’s Republic of China, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Republic of Korea, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Poland, Portugal, Romania, the Russian Federation, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, Turkey, Ukraine, United Kingdom, United States of America. <br >The participation of Croatia will become effective from the 15th July 2005. and the European Commission as a permanent observer, is to prevent the proliferation of nuclear weapons through export controls of nuclear and nuclear-related material, equipment, software and technology, without hindering the international cooperation on peaceful uses of nuclear energy.

Oslo, 24 June 2005