MOSCOW, November 19. /TASS/. The international community needs to coordinate its steps to make sure that the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty becomes an effective legal tool, Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement on Friday.
"Unfortunately, despite some undeniable achievements, the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty has not yet become an effective international legal tool. Well-coordinated steps by the international community are crucial for achieving this goal. Another eight nations from the so-called list of 44 need to ratify the treaty for it to come into force," she pointed out. "We expect that the Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization will continue large-scale activities aimed at facilitating the early achievement of this goal based on a mandate enshrined in a resolution on the commission’s establishment and the treaty itself," she added.
According to Zakharova, the Preparatory Commission has been taking effective steps to create conditions and infrastructure facilities necessary for the treaty’s effective operation. "In particular, the commission and its Provisional Technical Secretariat have been able to achieve considerable progress in the creation of the treaty’s control mechanism. International Monitoring System stations and the International Data Center are being put into operation," she noted.
The Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman emphasized that Moscow had been actively engaged in the Preparatory Commission’s work for 25 years. "The construction of the second largest segment of the International Monitoring System, which is part of the treaty’s global verification mechanism, is nearing completion on our territory," Zakharova specified. "Twenty-nine out of 32 Russian facilities have been fully put into operation," she added.
The United Nations General Assembly adopted the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty on September 10, 1996. On September 24, 1996, the document was opened for signing, but it still hasn’t taken effect as it needs to be ratified by the 44 countries listed in the treaty’s annex. The United States, China, Egypt, Israel and Iran have signed the treaty but haven’t ratified it yet, while three new nuclear powers - India, North Korea and Pakistan - have not signed the document.