JAKARTA: Foreign Minister Retno LP Marsudi (pic) has expressed hope that the global nuclear weapons non-proliferation agenda may gain more traction going forward, after Indonesia became the latest country to ratify the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW).
The TPNW is the first legally binding international agreement to comprehensively prohibit nuclear weapons with the ultimate goal being their total elimination.
The draft legislation was unanimously passed by the House of Representatives on Tuesday (Nov 21), just a week before the next meeting of the TPNW state parties at the United Nations headquarters in New York, the United States.
The new law must first be filed with and certified by the UN Office for Disarmament Affairs before the nation gains recognition as the latest ratifying state party.
Indonesia is one of 50 signatories to the treaty, which was first adopted on July 7, 2017, and entered into force on Jan. 22, 2021.
The country also held the vice presidency in the conference to negotiate the TPNW, but the progress to ratify the legislation itself only picked up last year.
“The ratification of the TPNW is our concrete effort [...] to fulfill the constitutional mandate of maintaining world peace and international security,” Retno said in a video statement from Moscow, Russia, on Wednesday.
She also underscored the treaty’s importance for Indonesia: that it proclaimed the illegality of the ownership and use of such weapons of mass destruction but provided some leeway for the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes.
Buoyed by newer developments of small-scale nuclear energy technologies, South-east Asia’s largest economy has been quietly considering them as options in a bid to achieve net-zero carbon emissions by 2060.
At the same time, Indonesia has maintained its staunch nonproliferation stance, having ratified the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 2011 and initiated the South-east Asia Nuclear Weapon-Free Zone (SEANWFZ) Treaty in 1995.
The minister said she was hopeful that even more countries would ratify the TPNW so as to apply even greater pressure on nuclear weapon states (NWSs) and establish strong global norms against the use of nuclear weapons.
“Indonesia will maintain its commitment to uphold international peace and security, including the comprehensive mainstreaming of the nuclear nonproliferation agenda,” she asserted.
At present, there are nine NWSs – Russia, the US, China, France, the United Kingdom, Pakistan, India, Israel and North Korea. The first five are also known as the P5, the permanent members of the UN Security Council.
According to 2023 data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), these nuclear-wielding states collectively possess around 12,512 nuclear weapons, of which 9,576 are considered operational.
Most of the stockpile belongs to the US and Russia. Currently, 69 of the 93 signatory countries have ratified the TPNW.
All NWSs have rejected the TPNW and similar nuclear non-proliferation treaties. Muhadi Sugiono, a campaigner for the Nobel Peace Prize-winning International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN) advocacy group, welcomed the passing of the TPNW in Indonesia.
“Indonesia’s ratification of the TPNW is something we’ve been patiently waiting for,” the international relations lecturer from Gadjah Mada University (UGM) told The Jakarta Post on Wednesday.
Muhadi also said he hoped Indonesia would be able to gain official recognition as a ratifying state party at the upcoming TPNW meeting.
“We at ICAN have looked forward to this moment, especially for its potential role in influencing public opinion in [Indonesia and other countries like] Australia,” he said.
Indonesia has been at odds with neighbouring Australia over the latter’s plan to commission nuclear-powered submarines from the US over the course of the next few decades under the AUKUS partnership.
With just 70 per cent of its target military arsenal available to secure its borders and vast maritime territory, Indonesia has expressed concerns about a potential arms race in the Indo-Pacific, a site of a tense geopolitical contest. - The Jakarta Post/ANN
