International Workshop for Peace and Disarmament in the Asia-Pacific Region(11/17) – Comments10(By Erwin Maulana)

How can civil society most effectively work for peacebuilding? The seminar held on November 17, 2010 in South Korean Human Rights Commision building presents the findings of peace activists from several countries which analysed the performance of civil society in regards to protection, monitoring, advocacy, and socialization of peace in situations of current Northeast Asia. It concludes civil society can play an important supportive role, but the effectiveness of its activities varied substantially. Contextual factors may limit or strengthen its ability to contribute to peacebuilding.

One of the problem that become an hot issue at the seminar is NWF  Disarmament.The concept of a Northeast Asian nuclear weapon-free zone (NWFZ) commonly refers to Japan and the two Koreas as the core of the zone, with three nuclear weapons states, the United States, Russia and China, pledging to refrain from using nuclear weapons inside the zone. The countries in the zone would be bound by a treaty to refrain from producing, possessing and testing nuclear weapons. The concept also includes the possibility that North Korea may join the zone at a later stage. Japanese Foreign Minister has talked about such a zone, but not yet as official Japanese policy.

The establishment of nuclear-weapon-free zones (NWFZs) contributes to controlling the spread of weapons of mass destruction and is an important step towards a nuclear-weapon-free world. To date, five treaties establishing NWFZs exist: the Treaty of Tlatelolco (Latin America and the Caribbean NWFZ), the Treaty of Rarotonga (South Pacific Nuclear-Free Zone), the Treaty of Bangkok (Southeast Asia NWFZ), the Treaty of Pelindaba (African NWFZ), the Central Asia Nuclear Weapon Free Zone (CANWFZ) Treaty. As the most recent development, the African NWFZ entered into force on July 15, 2009 thirteen years after it opened for signature. The newest treaty establishing the CANWFZ, was signed on September 8, 2006 by Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan at Semipalatinsk, a former nuclear test site in Kazakhstan. The NWFZ formally entered into force on March 21, 2009. With the approval of the CANWFZ treaty by Kazakhstan’s upper house of parliament on December 11, 2008, and subsequent signature by the president on January 5, 2009, ratification of the treaty was completed. In addition to these NWFZ treaties, other agreements, including the Antarctic Treaty, the Outer Space Treaty, the Moon Agreement, and the Seabed Treaty denuclearize and demilitarize specific areas of the globe, as well as outer space. (Mongolia also declares itself, and is internationally recognized, as a single-state nuclear weapon-free zone.)

Actually in the beginning of the 1990s, the end of Cold War has offered a great opportunity to change the existing military configuration and nuclear strategy in Northeast Asia. Against this background, the Joint Declaration on the Denuclearization of the Korean Peninsula was released on February 20, 1992. This epoch-making declaration commits both countries not to test, manufacture, produce, receive, posses, store, deploy or use nuclesr weapons. Although this is not regarded as one of NWFZs, it was de facto fourth NWFZ in the world (Ichiro Yuasa, Peace Depot). However there was a little progress since then. A verification system has not been established, and a protocol for the negative security assurance by surrounding nuclear weapon states (China, Russia, U.S.) has not been negotiated. It is realy regrettable that there are almost no actors in this region to iron out the practical details to continued the spirit of the declaration.

Twist and turns have continued in this region for 20 years afterwards. In order to denuclearize DPRK (North Korea), Six-party talks started in 2003 and reached a joint statement in September 2005, which is really valuable. However, the U.S. and DPRK no sooner come close to the solution of the problem than put emphasis on the difference of their respective recognition when they reach the final phase of the negotiation.

In order to achieve a NWFZ, as Mr. Ichiro from Japan has suggested us in his presentation at International Workshop for Peace and Disarmament in the Asia-Pacific Region (Seoul, November 17, 2010), a stronger public opinion to take initiatives toward a “common security” to overcome a security dilemma is needed. Such public sentiment would influence on the governments of concerned nations.

The first thing to do for the civil society is to stir up the public opinion among the parliamentarians, political parties, mayors and citizens of each nation. It is vital to build a wider support among parlianmentarians, who could directly influence their government. The issues of disarmament and security are closely realted to the lives of people living in local communities. Therefore, it is also vital to gain a support from local authorities who are obliged to protect their residents ‘lives and safety’.

Peace and stability on the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asia also is not an issue just for the men, as a speaker from Women Making Peace, Gyung-Lan Jung has said, because sustainable peace cannot be achieved by the government or men alone. Recently, women’s peace movement has come to recognize women not only as the victims of conflict but also as the solution makers. Women’s participation in peace-building in the Korean Peninsula and Northeast Asian is absolutely important. How women are involved in the peace process will make a difference in women’s post-conflict status itself.

Participation of civic groups is critical to conflict prevention and peace making, and in this regard a new partnership needs to be formed. To bring resolution to armed conflicts that are taking place in many parts of the world, active participation of civic and social groups rather than a single government or organization is required. We should seek a new framework of cooperation in which NGOs, peace activists, scholars, government representatives and international organizations work together to resolve conflicts all around Asia-Pacific.

It is now vitally important to construct a multi-layered cooperation in various area between Japan, ROK, and other Northeast Asia countries. There are five existing NWFZs in the world. However, none of them was established easily. It took as short as nine years from the time a government introduced the idea of NWFZ until the resolution to support it was adopted by the United Nations. In case of the African NWFZ Treaty, it took indeed as long as 35 years. As Mr. Ichiro Yuasa has put it, existing NWFZ treaties would not have been established without tenacious efforts to continue dialogue among concerned nations to resolve such problems one by one, and to cultivate the soil of mutual cooperation.