Statement by the French Representative (Scalabre) to the General Assembly: French Construction of Nuclear Power Station in South Africa [Extracts], October 5, 19761

After the statement made yesterday before the Assembly by the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Nigeria,2 my delegation would like to allay the concern which has been expressed and would like to add some clarifications regarding the contract concluded between the FRAMATOM French group and the South African company, Escom, to build a nuclear power station in Koberg. First, I should like to say how much France is aware of the value of this capital of goodwill and common interest that it has in Africa, and that His Excellency General Garba mentioned quite rightly in his statement. The French Government would not at any cost wish to compromise this arsenal and it is in this spirit that it has ensured the absolute impossibility for South Africa to progress towards obtaining military nuclear capacity thanks to building the Koberg power station. And I would make this quite clear, it is a material impossibility as well as an impossibility through the very contract engaged in. The Koberg nuclear power station is the so-called "light water pressurized" power station. Mr. de Guiringaud indicated in the Security Council that this type of power station uses as fuel a very low concentration of uranium, 2.5 to 2.7 concentration, which cannot be used for military objectives unless passed to an enrichment factory which is as complicated as the power station itself, and there are very few of this kind in the world. As to the products derived from the combustion of the uranium, they belong to the type of power station irradiated to such a degree that they cannot be used for either civil or military purposes unless they are reprocessed, an operation which requires a factory of such a complicated type, that there is only one in the world, in France, while one other one of this type is being built in the United States of America, another in Great Britain and one is being projected in the Federal Republic of Germany. Because of all these characteristics, the building of the Koberg power station does not run counter to resolution 3411G (XXX) adopted on 15 [10] December 1975 by the General Assembly requesting Governments to stop making available to South Africa any kind of equipment which would allow that State to acquire nuclear-weapon capability which can be used to military ends.3

Added to these impossibilities, there is the guarantee of the IAEA. South Africa, as His Excellency General Garba pointed out, is not a signatory of the non-proliferation treaty. France has not signed it

1A/31/PV.18 (prov.), pp. 136-141.

A/31/PV.16 (prov.), p. 86.

For text, see General Assembly Official Records: Thirtieth Session, Supplement No. 34 (A/10034), pp. 38-39.

4

The treaty. text can be found in Documents on Disarmament, 1968, pp. 461– 465.

either because of the discriminatory character of the treaty. Nevertheless, it has decided that all nuclear exports would be subject to the control of the IAEA. This principle has naturally been applied in the case of the Koberg power station and it was stipulated that this control would apply to all the nuclear fuel cycle in the power station. A bilateral agreement between South Africa and France has been added to the tripartite arrangement between the two countries and the Atomic Agency. This agreement was approved on 17 September by the Council of the Board of Governors of the Agency and France provided the latter with all necessary information for carrying out an appraisal of the conditions in which these guarantees would be applied.

His Excellency General Garba has expressed doubts as to the effectiveness of this control, but if these doubts are well-founded the situation will be very serious, not only in South Africa, but throughout the world. Almost 80 nuclear power stations have been sold to countries abroad, a large number of which do not have the same characteristics of safety as has the Koberg power station, and for which the IAEA controls are the only guarantees of non-proliferation. The buying countries are not all signatories of the non-proliferation treaty or were not when the contract was signed. Our African friends object that South Africa is a special case; that this country cannot be trusted. But this would mean that the IAEA controls are only effective if exercised by countries which can be trusted. This would be tantamount to saying that these controls have no technical value and would result in the banning of any industrial nuclear power sales to non-nuclear countries. Developing countries would then be unjustly deprived of the right which had been affirmed by several international acts to benefit from the peaceful uses of atomic power.

To the usual controls of the IAEA, France has added a kind of super control through extra caution inspired by the concern to reassure the African countries, and I will quote, inter alia, the additional provisions. First, it has been stipulated that any power station which may be built in South Africa using technical elements provided by France, for the building of the Koberg power station would be subject to the same types of control as that power station. Use of French technology is therefore not free and leaves no possible opportunity for misuse or diversion. Furthermore, the fuel used in Koberg can be reprocessed only outside of South Africa and the plutonium resulting from this treatment, will be stocked outside of South Africa in the country which has prepared and provided the fuel to be used for that power station. South Africa would find it impossible to lay hands on the plutonium, the only element in the reprocessing process which could be used to military ends.

I note that this information adds to that given by France in June. I would recall that any country which has signed the non-proliferation treaty may, under article 10 denounce it at three months' notice. This is not the case with the guarantees imposed by France which are con

tractual and cannot be terminated unilaterally. These contractual guarantees are additional, as I have said, to the physical impossibility of using the fuel and the plutonium and acquiring reprocessed products. Any attempt to do so would be doomed to failure. Any attempt to infringe the control rules would lead to an immediate termination of the contract and the cutting off all French supplies or aid.

In these conditions the Koberg power station could no longer function. So, to sum up the conditions under which the Koberg power station would become operative in five years at the earliest, my delegation can confirm that there is no risk of the station being diverted from its function of providing electric power, and this applies to any technological component, any amount of nuclear material, however small, or any of the fissionable products used in the construction and utilization of the power station. Needless to say, had it been otherwise the French Government would have refused its guarantee and authorization to any contract concluded between FRAMATOM and South Africa rather than be the origin of what our African friends might consider to be a risk of any kind. In conclusion, I should like to make it known to the members of the Assembly that my delegation is available to any member who wishes to have more detailed technical information regarding the controls stipulated with respect to the operation of the Koberg power station.

Presidential Campaign Debate Between President Ford and Governor Carter: Strategic Arms Limitations and Nuclear Proliferation [Extract], October 6, 19761

Mr. Trewhitt: Mr. President, you referred earlier to your meeting with Mr. Brezhnev at Vladivostok in 1974. You agreed on that occasion to try to achieve another strategic arms limitation, SALT, agreement, within the year. Nothing happened in 1975 or not very much publicly, at least, and those talks are still dragging, and things got quieter as the current season approached. Is there a bit of politics involved there, perhaps on both sides or perhaps more important, are interim weapons developments, and I am thinking of such things as the cruise missile and the Soviet SS-20 intermediate range rocket, making SALT irrelevant, bypassing the SALT negotiations?

The President: First, we have to understand that SALT I expires October 3, 1977. Mr. Brezhnev and I met in Vladivostok in December of 1974 for the purpose of trying to take the initial steps so we

1 Weekly Compilation of Presidential Documents, Oct. 11, 1976, pp. 1453-1454

could have a SALT II agreement that would go to 1985. As I indicated earlier, we did agree on a 2,400 limitation on launchers of ballistic missiles. That would mean a cutback in the Soviet program. It would not interfere with our own program. At the same time we put a limitation of 1,320 on MIRV's.2

Our technicians have been working since that time in Geneva trying to put into technical language an agreement that can be verified by both parties. In the meantime, there has developed the problem of the Soviet Backfire, their high performance aircraft, which they say is not a long-range aircraft and which some of our people say is an intercontinental aircraft.

In the interim, there has been the development on our part primarily, the cruise missiles-cruise missiles that could be launched from land-based mobile installations; cruise missiles that could be launched from high performance aircraft like the B-52's or the B-1's, which I hope we proceed with; cruise missiles which could be launched from either surface or submarine naval vessels. Those gray area weapons systems are creating some problems in the agreement for a SALT II negotiation.

But I can say that I am dedicated to proceeding. And I met just last week with the Foreign Minister of the Soviet Union, and he indicated to me that the Soviet Union was interested in narrowing the differences and making a realistic and a sound compromise.

I hope and trust in the best interests of both countries and in the best interests of all peoples throughout this globe that the Soviet Union and the United States can make a mutually beneficial agreement because, if we do not and SALT I expires on October 3, 1977, you will unleash again an all-out nuclear arms race with the potential of a nuclear holocaust of unbelievable dimensions. So, it is the obligation of the President to do just that, and I intend to do so.

Mr. Trewhitt: Mr. President, let me follow that up. I'll submit that the cruise missile adds a whole new dimension to the arms competition, and then cite a statement by your office to the arms control association a few days ago in which you said that the cruise missile might eventually be included in a comprehensive arms limitation agreement, but that in the meantime it was an essential part of the American strategic arsenal. Now may I assume from that that you are tending to exclude the cruise missile from the next SALT agreement or is it still negotiable in that context?

The President: I believe that the cruise missiles which we are now developing in research and development across the spectrum, from air, from the sea, or from the land can be included within a SALT II agreement. They are a new weapons system that has a great potential,

'The Vladivostok agreements appear in Documents on Disarmament, 1974, pp. 746-747. For the SALT I agreements, see ibid., 1972, pp. 197 ff.

both conventional and nuclear armed. At the same time, we have to make certain that the Soviet Union's Backfire, which they claim is not an intercontinental aircraft and which some of our people contend is, must also be included if we are to get the kind of an agreement which is in the best interests of both countries.

And I really believe that it's far better for us and for the Soviet Union and, more importantly, for the people around the world that these two super powers find an answer for a SALT II agreement before October 3, 1977. I think good will on both parts, hard bargaining by both parties, and a reasonable compromise will be in the best interests of all parties.

The Moderator: Governor Carter.

Mr. Carter: Well, Mr. Ford acts like he is running for President for the first time. He has been in office 2 years and there has been absʊlutely no progress made toward a new SALT agreement. He has learned the date of the expiration of SALT I, apparently.

We have seen in this world a development of a tremendous threat to us. As a nuclear engineer myself, I know the limitations and capabilities of atomic power. I also know that as far as the human beings on this Earth are concerned, that the nonproliferation of atomic weapons is number one. Only in the last few days with the election approaching has Mr. Ford taken any interest in a nonproliferation movement.

I advocated last May, in a speech at the United Nations, that we move immediately as a nation to declare a complete moratorium on the testing of all nuclear devices, both weapons and peaceful devices, that we not ship any more atomic fuel to a country that refuses to comply with strict controls over the waste which can be reprocessed into explosives. I've also advocated that we stop the sale by Germany and France of reprocessing plants to Pakistan and Brazil. Mr. Ford hasn't moved on this. We also need to provide an adequate supply of enriched uranium. Mr. Ford again, under pressure from the atomic energy lobby, has insisted that this reprocessing or rather reenrichment be done by private industry and not by the existing government plants.

This kind of confusion and absence of leadership has let us drift now for 2 years with the constantly increasing threat of atomic weapons throughout the world. We now have five nations that have atomic bombs that we know about. If we continue under Mr. Ford's policy, by 1985 or '90, we will have 20 nations that have the capability of exploding atomic weapons. This has got to be stopped. That is one of the major challenges and major undertakings that I will assume as the next President.

3 Ante, pp. 292–303.