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L’A TLAS DU MONDE DIPLOMATIQUE I 23
Recent nuclear powers
Countries suspected of
developing nuclear weapons
A black square represents about 100
nuclear warheads
Sources: Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI); Federation of American Scientists (FAS); Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC); Educational
Foundation for Nuclear Science (EFNS); Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists; The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
Longstanding nuclear
powers
and poor
drawn between military weapons,
which require large-scale industrial
facilities, and toxic agents that can be
synthesised in small quantities in an
ordinary laboratory.
Over the last 15 years western coun-
tries, apart from the US, have started
reducing the size of their chemical
and biological stockpile. But at the
same time some developing countries
have started upgrading their weapons,
increasing their strategic value. Egypt
and Yemen used poison gas in the
1960s. In 1988 Iraq’s use of chemical
weapons against the Kurds prompted
other countries in the area, in parti-
cular Iran, Syria and Israel, to acquire
such weapons.
Moscow’s policy in this respect is a
source of concern. After the break-up
of the Soviet Union in 1991 Russia
kept about 40,000 tonnes of chemical
materials, accounting for two-thirds of
the total worldwide. Through official
sales or contraband it has become a
key centre for their dissemination.
The 1972 Biological and Toxin
Weapons Convention, which came
into force in 1977, bans their deve-
lopment, production and storage,
except for peaceful purposes. Howe-
ver in 2001 the US opposed plans to
introduce stricter controls for enfor-
cement of the treaty. The 1993 Che-
mical Weapons Convention bans the
development, production and storage
of chemical weapons.
Dirty bombs, which combine con-
ventional explosives and radioactive
materials to contaminate the largest
possible area, are themost likely vector
for deliberate nuclear pollution by a
terrorist group. These devices have not
so far been used, so they do not count
as WMDs, but they are nevertheless
among the weapons terrorist groups
might use.
On the web
10 000
20 000
30 000
40 000
1950 1955 1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000
0
2005
5 000
United States USSR
(Russia from 1992)
United Kingdom
France and China
Sources: Federation of American Scientists (FAS); Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.
The real nuclear powers in 2005
Changes in nuclear stockpile
> Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical
Weapons (OPCW):
> International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA):
> Carnegie Endowment for International Peace:
> United Nations Institute for Disarmament
Research (UNIDIR):
> Centre for Nonproliferation Studies (CNS):