Press Release No. 161-03
10 April 2003

RATIFICATION OF NUCLEAR PACT TO HIGHLIGHT RUSSIA’S COMMITMENT TO INTERNATIONAL PEACE AND SECURITY – OPLE

The Philippines welcomes the announcement this week by senior Russian lawmakers that they will soon consider the ratification of an important nuclear arms reduction treaty with the United States that had been delayed in protest over the American-led war on Iraq, according to Foreign Affairs Secretary Blas F. Ople.

“The leaders of Russia have not allowed their differences with the United States on the issue of Iraq to stand in the way of their common desire to take meaningful steps towards reducing nuclear dangers,’” Secretary Ople said.

“The Philippines would like to particularly cite the leadership of President Vladimir Putin, who set aside his own objections to the war in Iraq and who called on the Russian lawmakers to ratify this treaty,” the Secretary added.

President Putin and President George W. Bush signed last May the treaty, requiring both nations to cut their deployed strategic nuclear arsenals by about two-thirds by 2012.  The Russian Duma was expected to consider the treaty last month, but indefinitely postponed any vote because of bitter differences with the Americans over the use of force against Iraq.

The proliferation of nuclear weapons in the United States and the Soviet Union took place during the Cold War, the era of conflict between the West and the Soviet Union and its allied communist nations.

“This landmark agreement, which will require both countries to make deep reductions in their nuclear arsenals, will help pave the way towards eliminating the remaining legacies of the Cold War,” the Secretary said.

On the nuclear weapons policy of the Philippines, the Secretary said that the country has taken the nuclear weapons-free provision in the Constitution several steps further, and has worked with other countries in the name of global nuclear disarmament.  “The Philippines is a State Party to the Southeast Asian Nuclear Weapons-Free Zone Treaty and is a State Party to all the major multilateral nuclear disarmament agreements. In our diplomacy, we actively and consistently support efforts to achieve a world free from nuclear weapons,” the Secretary said. END.