Hoshyar Zebari Thomas R. Pickering Tibor Tóth Man-Made Crater Ever Created

issue 20 july 2013

www.ctbto.org We Are Our Own Enemy, Alamogordo, 20 CTBTO New Mexico, USA,1945 by SpectruM Elin ctbto Magazine issue 20 | July 2013 O’Hara Slavick

This drawing by Elin O’Hara Slavick takes as its reference an aerial photograph from the Los Alamos National Laboratory Archive of the

crater formed by the first atomic explosion.

On 16 July 1945 the Trinity test took place at the Alamogordo Test Range in New Mexico, USA. It was the first nuclear explosion in history.

The detonation is credited as the beginning of the Atomic Age.

See page 34 in this issue for more information about the artist and her work.

Saucer-shaped craters caused by subsidence following the underground nuclear tests at the Nevada Test Site. Courtesy of U.S. Department of Energy. ctbto spectrum

Crater from the 1962 “Sedan” nuclear test, the largest Hoshyar Zebari Thomas R. Pickering Tibor Tóth man-made crater ever created. Courtesy of U.S. Department of Energy. IRAQ’s FOREIGN MINISTER Former U.S. Under Secretary CTBTO EXECUTIVE SECRETARY of State for Political Affairs The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) bans all nuclear explosions.

It opened for signature on 24 September 1996 in New York.

As of June 2013, 183 countries had signed the Treaty and 159 had ratified. Of the 44 nuclear capable States which must ratify the CTBT for it to enter into force, the so-called Annex 2 countries, 36 have done so to date while eight have yet to ratify: China, the Democratic People's Republic of Korea, Egypt, India, Iran, Israel, Pakistan and the United States.

The Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear- Editor-in-Chief: Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) consists of the States Annika Thunborg, Signatories and the Provisional Technical Secretariat. Spokesperson and Chief of Public Information The main tasks of the CTBTO are to promote signatures and ratifications and to establish a global verification regime Prepared, coordinated and edited by: capable of detecting nuclear explosions underground, Denise Brettschneider underwater and in the atmosphere.

CTBTO contributors: The regime must be operational when the Treaty enters Matthias Auer, Cristina Arribas, Marina Begovic, into force. It will consist of 337 monitoring facilities Glenn Leaper, Eneko Ruiz Jimenez, Angela Leuker, supported by an International Data Centre and Katharina Wiebke Michael, Thomas Muetzelburg, on-site inspection measures. As of 3 June 2013 over Caroline Wagner, Jingchao Zhou 85 percent of the facilities of the International Monitoring System (IMS) were operational.

Layout and Design: Krzysztof Kolasinski, Pablo Mehlhorn , Todd Vincent

Distribution: Pablo Mehlhorn

Photographs and illustrations are at the courtesy of the authors and the Provisional Technical Secretariat.

Please visit www.ctbto.org Your resource published by: Public Information for stopping nuclear testing Preparatory Commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) If you wish to download the online version of the CTBTO Spectrum Vienna International Centre please visit www.ctbto.org or download our CTBTO Spectrum App P.O. Box 1200 from Apple’s App Store. 1400 Vienna, Austria

T +43 1 26030 6200 Disclaimer: The views expressed in articles by external contributors do F +43 1 26030 5823 not necessarily reflect the positions and policies of the CTBTO E [email protected] Preparatory Commission. I www.ctbto.org The boundaries and presentation of material on maps do not imply the expression of any opinion on the part of the Provisional Technical Printed in Austria, June 2013 Secretariat concerning the legal status of any country, territory, on Munken Lynx Paper city or area or its authorities, or concerning the delimitation of its © 2013 CTBTO Preparatory Commission wood and acid-free, frontiers or boundaries. CTBTO Spectrum – ISSN: 1680-533X certified by the Forest Stewardship Council Table of Contents

Editorial 2 CTBTO Spokesperson Annika Thunborg

Treaty Status 3 CTBT signatures and ratifications (as of 12 July 2013)

VOICES 4 The CTBT: One of the most important international instruments by Hoshyar Zebari, Iraq's Foreign Minister

7 U.S. leadership needed to prevent nuclear testing by North Korea by Thomas R. Pickering, former U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs

10 Wanted: An end to nuclear nationalism in South Asia But the public mood for peace needs international support by Zia Mian, Research Scientist, Princeton University, USA

CTBT: Science and Technology 2013 Conference 14 Photo highlights

INTERVIEW 16 Face to Face with CTBTO Executive Secretary Tibor Tóth: Looking back, looking forward

STATION STATUS 21 Certified International Monitoring System facilities (as of 12 July 2013)

Verification Science 22 Seismic Detective Work: CTBTO monitoring system ‘very effective’ in detecting North Korea’s third nuclear test Interview with Paul Richards, Special Research Scientist, Columbia University, USA

26 Detection of radioactive gases consistent with North Korean test underlines strength of CTBTO monitoring system

27 The noble gas releases from Fukushima: Some implications and reflections by Anders Axelsson and Anders Ringbom, Swedish Defense Research Agency

32 The Chelyabinsk meteor: Massive blast detected by 17 infrasound stations Interview with Margaret Campbell-Brown, Astronomer, University of Western Ontario, Canada

ART AND NUCLEAR TESTING 34 Featuring Elin O'Hara Slavick, Art Professor, University of North Carolina, USA

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 Editorial ANNIKA THUNBORG CTBTO SPOKESPERSON

nuclear testing and its effects on human Middle East. The media reports and publishes health and security, the history of arms op-eds, and experts and students visit the control efforts, the current debate on entry CTBTO where they receive in-depth briefings. into force, and daily press clippings. I expect this trend to continue.

We soon discovered that video-audio, I hope you will enjoy the articles in this animations and multimedia were the ideal issue – each one of which develops a topic means to explain the complexities of the touched upon above. Iraq’s Foreign Minister verification regime. We built up video-audio Hoshyar Zebari reports on the Iraqi capabilities from scratch and produced Parliament’s steps towards ratification. broadcast quality reports from the on-site Ambassador Thomas Pickering, who helped inspection exercise in Kazakhstan, the Kennedy administration draft the Partial maintenance work at stations in Greenland, Test Ban Treaty, describes how much the Argentina and Canada, and the triple United States has to gain from ratifying the disaster in Japan in March 2011. Social CTBT. Zia Mian from Princeton University media were embraced and online campaigns focuses on the role of civil society in South When North Korea announced that it had such as the “infamous” nuclear test Asia in advocating nuclear disarmament. conducted its third nuclear test in February, anniversaries helped reach millions of new, CTBTO Member States had already been young viewers, including audiences in Columbia University’s Paul Richards informed. So had the media. Over the years, countries less accessible through the explains the seismic findings of the announced the CTBTO has become a reliable, credible and traditional media. North Korean nuclear test. We also elaborate swift source of information for any journalist on the radionuclide findings. Astronomer who follows nuclear issues - be it nuclear tests Exhibitions were set up for visitors to Margaret Campbell-Brown explains how or a nuclear accident such as Fukushima – or the UN in Vienna, New York and Geneva. CTBTO data help us understand the any other man-made or natural phenomenon CTBTO Spectrum developed into a characteristics of the meteor over the Ural that our global monitoring system picks up. professional and intellectually mountains. Anders Ringbom and Anders stimulating magazine. Axelsson of the Swedish Defense Research The unique information registered by Agency draw lessons from the detection of our infrasound sensors when a meteor These developments would not have noble gases from the Fukushima nuclear exploded over central Russia in February been possible without the support of accident. An overview of the recent Science appealed to new audiences. The video we Member States, colleagues in the technical and Technology Conference in Vienna is also produced went viral on YouTube and was divisions who have mainstreamed public presented. watched by outer space geeks and information into their activities and have entertainment buffs alike. The media and contributed through articles, blogs, The paintings by Elin o’Hara Slavick online interest was unprecedented: in interviews and visuals, my professional and show the power of the arts in communicating February alone, the number of press reports dedicated team of ten staff members and political messages. exceeded 2,500 plus broadcast coverage by consultants plus interns. The transformation CNN, BBC and other major networks. With the also had the full support of the Executive We look forward to hearing from the detection of radioactivity in April that could be Secretary Tibor Tóth and his successor, next Executive Secretary of the CTBTO, attributed to the North Korean test, interest International Data Centre Director Lassina Lassina Zerbo, who will take office on 1 surged again. Zerbo, who both understand how crucial August, in the next issue of CTBTO Spectrum, advocacy is for achieving the objectives of and wish him every success as the new head Naturally, these results are due to the the CTBTO, for completing and enhancing of the organization. impressive performance of the CTBT the performance of the CTBT verification verification regime. But they are also due to regime and for promoting the universality Last but not least, let me take this the advocacy work developed by CTBTO and entry into force of the Treaty. opportunity to thank the Executive Public Information over the years. Secretary, Tibor Tóth, for his visionary and The debate about the CTBT has always creative leadership and professional and From having been reactive, public been vibrant in the United States with the efficient management during his eight information has become proactive, strategic participation of all aspects of society. years in office. His own reflections can be and transparent. The public website has been Recently, we have also witnessed a stronger read on page 16. We wish him all the best turned into a “one-stop-shop” for everything engagement in Asia, including China, India and look forward to our continued relevant to the CTBT, including the history of and Pakistan, and partially also in the collaboration in the future.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 Status of Signatures and Ratifications As of 12 JUly 2013

ICELAND FINLAND RUSSIAN FEDERATION NORWAY SWEDEN ESTONIA CANADA UNITED KINGDOM LATVIA OF GREAT BRITAIN DENMARK AND NORTHERN IRELAND LITHUANIA NETHERLANDS BELARUS POLAND IRELAND BELGIUM SLOVAKIA UKRAINE LUXEMBOURG GERMANY CZECH REPUBLIC AUSTRIA REPUBLIC OF MOLDOVA FRANCE LIECHTENSTEIN HUNGARY KAZAKHSTAN SLOVENIA ROMANIA SWITZERLAND CROATIA BOSNIA AND MONGOLIA SAN MARINO HERZEGOVINA MONACO ITALY SERBIA BULGARIA ANDORRA MONTENEGRO HOLY SEE GEORGIA UZBEKISTAN KYRGYZSTAN DEMOCRATIC PEOPLE`S THE FORMER REPUBLIC OF KOREA PORTUGAL SPAIN ALBANIA YUGOSLAV REPUBLIC AZERBAIJAN UNITED STATES OF AMERICA TURKMENISTAN OF MACEDONIA TURKEY ARMENIA TAJIKISTAN GREECE REPUBLIC JAPAN MALTA OF KOREA CYPRUS SYRIAN ARAB REPUBLIC CHINA TUNISIA LEBANON AFGHANISTAN MOROCCO ISRAEL IRAQ ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF IRAN JORDAN ALGERIA LIBYAN KUWAIT PAKISTAN ARAB NEPAL JAMAHIRIYA EGYPT BAHRAIN BHUTAN QATAR BANGLADESH BAHAMAS UNITED ARAB EMIRATES SAUDI ARABIA INDIA MYANMAR, REPUBLIC OF THE UNION OF MEXICO CUBA LAO PEOPLE'S DOMINICAN MAURITANIA OMAN REPUBLIC DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC JAMAICAHAITI ANTIGUA AND BARBUDA MALI BELIZE SAINT KITTS AND NEVIS CAPE VERDE NIGER DOMINICA HONDURAS CHAD ERITREA YEMEN THAILAND SAINT LUCIA SENEGAL GUATEMALA SAINT VINCENT AND SUDAN VIET NAM PHILIPPINES GAMBIA EL SALVADOR NICARAGUA THE GRENADINES BARBADOS BURKINA FASO GUINEA-BISSAU DJIBOUTI CAMBODIA GRENADA GUINEA TRINIDAD & TOBAGO BENIN NIGERIA COSTA RICA SIERRA LEONE ETHIOPIA PANAMA BOLIVARIAN REPUBLIC TOGO CENTRAL PALAU SOUTH FEDERATED STATES OF VENEZUELA CÔTE D'IVOIRE AFRICAN SRI LANKA OF MICRONESIA MARSHALL ISLANDS REPUBLIC SUDAN GUYANA GHANA CAMEROON BRUNEI DARUSSALAM COLOMBIA LIBERIA SURINAME MALAYSIA SOMALIA SINGAPORE KIRIBATI EQUATORIAL GUINEA DEMOCRATIC UGANDA SAO TOME AND PRINCIPE REPUBLIC KENYA ECUADOR GABON CONGO OF THE MALDIVES INDONESIA NAURU CONGO RWANDA BURUNDI SEYCHELLES UNITED REPUBLIC PAPUA NEW GUINEA OF TANZANIA BRAZIL TUVALU TIMOR-LESTE SOLOMON ISLANDS PERU ANGOLA COMOROS SAMOA MALAWI ZAMBIA VANUATU BOLIVIA MOZAMBIQUE MADAGASCAR FIJI NIUE ZIMBABWE MAURITIUS TONGA COOK ISLANDS NAMIBIA BOTSWANA PARAGUAY AUSTRALIA SWAZILAND

LESOTHO CHILE SOUTH AFRICA URUGUAY ARGENTINA

Signatory States Ratifying States Non-Signatory States NEW ZEALAND Total States: 195 183 159 13 ● Annex 2 States: 44 41 36 3 FOR MORE DETAILED INFORMATION ON SIGNATURE AND RATIFICATION VISIT WWW.CTBTO.ORG/MAP

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CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 voices The CTBT: One of the most important international instruments

By Hoshyar Zebari Iraq's Foreign Minister

We are striving to create a safer to which we were subjected because Council of Representatives approved a world for ourselves and for future of the possession of these weapons. law on ratification by the Republic of generations, a world free of weapons We have also been greatly affected by Iraq of the CTBT on 9 October 2012. of mass destruction (WMD). The the international sanctions imposed by international commitment to the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) Iraq is taking these steps towards Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty resolutions that prevented Iraq from disarmament and non-proliferation (CTBT) represents one of the most making any technological and scientific and the destruction of all kinds of prominent mechanisms for achieving progress for a number of years, most WMD not only as a fulfilment of UNSC a nuclear-weapon-free world. I was specifically between 1990 and December resolutions, but also because the Iraqi keen to take part in the last two CTBT 2010. As a result of this suffering but Constitution, which was approved in Ministerial Meetings in 2010 and equally because of our sincere desire 2005 after the collapse of the former 2012 to promote the Treaty’s entry to rid the Middle East of the menace regime in 2003, bans the use and the into force, which were held on the of nuclear weapons, Iraq is keen to possession of such weapons. Here, I fringes of the UN General Assembly contribute to global efforts to enhance would like to draw attention to Article 9 sessions. I participated not only to an international system for disarmament of the Iraqi Constitution on the banning express Iraq’s desire to reiterate the and the non-proliferation of WMD. of WMD for its importance in our importance of supporting the Treaty internal and foreign policy: but also to reaffirm the support of We consider both the Nuclear Iraq for the entire disarmament and Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) with its 'The Iraqi Government shall non-proliferation regime. three interrelated pillars (disarmament, respect and implement Iraq's non-proliferation and the peaceful use international obligations regarding the Iraq’s desire to enhance of nuclear energy) and the CTBT as the non-proliferation, non-development, the international system main cornerstones of this system. In Iraq non-production and non-use of for disarmament and we have made a number of achievements nuclear, chemical and biological non-proliferation in this regard. We have ratified the weapons and shall prohibit associated Additional Protocol to the Safeguards equipment, material, technologies When we tackle the subject of WMD, in Agreements with the International and delivery systems for use in Iraq we are talking about our personal Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), we the development, manufacture, experience and the intense suffering signed the CTBT in 2008 and the Iraqi production and use of such weapons.'

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 In this regard, it might be useful to »The Iraqi Council of the Treaty, although it cannot be a indicate that Iraq has documented all the substitute for a comprehensive universal steps it has taken in that matter within the of Representatives and legally binding agreement. respective international forums. Iraq has approved a law on also expressed its respect and commitment In 2009 the international community to disarmament, arms control and ratification by the received positive signs when President non-proliferation- related international Republic of Iraq Barack Obama declared that his treaties, agreements and arrangements. Administration would follow up the matter of the CTBT on 9 of ratification of the CTBT by Congress. The Government of Iraq has adopted October 2012.« Since Congress did not ratify the Treaty a number of legislative and executive during the first term of President Obama, measures in this regard in order to reflect we truly hope that this will be achieved its commitments in a practical way. The 2 of the Treaty1, would enhance the during his second term, especially since Government of Iraq also believes that the international system of disarmament and there is a moral responsibility borne by the total elimination of WMD would provide non-proliferation. Moreover, ratification United States as it was the first and only the international community with a true of the CTBT by the main nuclear weapon State that has ever actually used a nuclear guarantee against the use or the threat to States would encourage other remaining weapon in wartime. use these weapons. Annex 2 States to ratify or sign the Treaty. In Iraq, we welcome the voluntary CTBT as an efficient CTBT’s entry into force will moratorium on nuclear testing as an monitoring system for enhance the international important pathway to reaching the goals disaster mitigation system of disarmament ______and non-proliferation [1] Annex 2 lists 44 countries that possessed The world has witnessed the tragedies nuclear power or research reactors when the CTBT was being negotiated. The eight Annex caused by the use of nuclear weapons There is no doubt that the entry into 2 States that must still ratify before the Treaty and other WMD during the past century. force of the CTBT, after its ratification can enter into force are: China, the Democratic We have also witnessed so far in the People’s Republic of Korea, Egypt, India, Iran, st by the eight remaining States in Annex Israel, Pakistan and the United States. 21 century the devastating aftermath

Foreign ministers attending the sixth CTBT Ministerial Meeting on 27 September 2012 in New York, USA. Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari is standing in the back row third from right.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 Demarcation of nuclear- weapon-free zones, nuclear-weapon-free status and nuclear-weapon-free geographical regions.

Iraq supports the creation of a nuclear-weapon-free zone in the Middle East.

Map courtesy of the United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs.

of natural disasters caused by tsunamis, to obtain the necessary technology safeguards system, we also consider in addition to the dangers resulting and materials needed to produce such it necessary that the international from damage to energy generating weapons. Meanwhile, we are facing community mobilizes support to nuclear power plants (such as the various challenges in that field but convene a conference in Helsinki, Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant most importantly, the fact that many Finland, in 2013 on the establishment accident in March 2011). The CTBT countries possess the materials and of a Middle East zone free of nuclear and its verification system which, when knowledge necessary to produce nuclear weapons and all other WMD. Such a complete, will consist of 337 monitoring weapons. Moreover, the technology to conference was planned for 2012 but facilities spread around the globe, can produce these weapons is widespread did not take place. This would help help tsunami warning centres issue and available on the black market. prevent fears of a nuclear arms race earlier alerts as well as monitoring the What really concerns the international in the region from becoming a reality, distribution of radiation in the event community is the danger of terrorist a race that represents a threat to the of a nuclear accident These civil and groups acquiring nuclear weapons region's stability and consequently to scientific applications can definitely help and the threat they would pose to international peace and security. in mitigating the dangers resulting from our security. It is imperative that we such disasters, despite the fact that the coordinate regional and international Biographical note verification system has been designed efforts as a sine qua non requirement to enable the Preparatory Commission in order to deter these threats against Hoshyar Zebari for the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban international peace and security. was first appointed Minister for Foreign Affairs of Iraq in September Treaty Organization (CTBTO) in Vienna 2003, continuing to serve in this to monitor all nuclear tests that might be Our goal is to establish position with successive conducted around the world. a zone free of nuclear governments. Prior to this, he weapons and other WMD became a member of the Iraqi Global concern regarding in the Middle East Opposition Coordination and Follow-Up Committee in 2002 after the possession of WMD serving as a member of the Iraqi by terrorist groups With regard to the Middle-East, it is one National Congress Leadership Council of the most notable regions of tension from 1999. In 1992 he became Head The world would be much safer for in the world. Just as it is vital for the of International Relations of the Iraqi all of us and for future generations sake of security in the region that all Opposition and was also elected to the Kurdistani National Assembly, without nuclear weapons and all other of the States in the Middle East ratify serving as the principal negotiator in WMD. Reality, however, indicates the CTBT and the NPT and that their the Kurdish peace process in 1994. that terrorist groups might be able nuclear facilities are subject to the IAEA

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 voices U.S. leadership needed to prevent nuclear testing by North Korea

by Thomas R. Pickering Former U.S. UNDer Secretary of State for Political Affairs

Four years ago, President Obama warned that “the threat of global nuclear war has gone down, but the risk of a nuclear attack has gone up.” On 12 February 2013, North Korea’s nuclear weapons test explosion – its third and the world’s 2,053rd – underscored the urgent need for stronger barriers to prevent the testing, spread, and use of the world’s most dangerous weapons.

In his first term, Mr Obama made significant progress to reduce nuclear dangers. This included cuts in excess U.S. and Russian cold-war nuclear stockpiles and locking up vulnerable nuclear material from terrorists. But there is more to be done. countries like Pakistan, India, and North U.S. leadership is especially critical to the Korea that are not signatories. And it »Now is the right implementation of the 1996 Comprehensive would establish a clear norm for countries time for the Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT), which bans all like China and Iran that have both signed, nuclear test explosions. The United States and but not ratified, the Treaty. White House to 183 other nations have signed the CTBT, but America must still ratify the Treaty to bring it During his first term, Obama launch a high- into force. repeatedly pledged to work with the Senate level push for to secure U.S. ratification of the CTBT. Now The U.S. has not conducted a nuclear is the right time for the White House to ratifying the test explosion for more than 20 years. Since launch a high-level push for ratifying the there is no technical or military need to do Treaty and for the Senate to join in closing Treaty and for so ever again, ratifying the Treaty would not the door on nuclear testing. the Senate to hinder U.S. nuclear readiness. Other countries like North Korea, or even China, however, The case for the CTBT is join in closing could use further nuclear tests to perfect stronger than ever more sophisticated and deadly warhead the door on designs. U.S. ratification of the Treaty would U.S. ratification of the CTBT would nuclear testing.« send a clear message to nuclear capable increase the global leverage necessary to

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 Security Council found unanimously at a summit-level meeting in January 1992 that nuclear proliferation is a threat to world peace and security. If a signatory country violated the nuclear testing ban, action to enforce the Treaty could include sanctions and use of force if authorized. If that action were to be vetoed, Treaty members would be free to act individually in response, including resuming testing if they believed it was necessary.

Beginning with Dwight Eisenhower, U.S. presidents have sought an end to nuclear testing. It has been a half-century since President John F. Kennedy sought to negotiate a comprehensive test ban but achieved only the Limited Test Ban Treaty. A quarter century has passed since President Barack Obama speaking at the Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany, 19 June 2013, where he reiterated his call to build Presidents Ronald Reagan and George support in the United States to ratify the CTBT. H. W. Bush secured the ratification of curtail North Korea’s nuclear weapons know more now about how to sustain the treaties banning high-yield test programme and help deter Iran’s leaders the arsenal than years ago when the U.S. explosions and so-called “peaceful” from pursuing a nuclear weapon. conducted nuclear tests. nuclear explosions. Completing work on the Treaty would also reduce nuclear tensions between An additional tool to Today, the United States is India and Pakistan and between India and deter potential testing acting within the framework of the China, and enhance security and stability responsibilities of the Comprehensive throughout Asia. Critics oppose U.S. CTBT ratification Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty but is not because they say the Treaty is unverifiable reaping the full security benefits in U.S. leadership on the Treaty would – that signatory countries may cheat, and return because it has not yet ratified also build support to strengthen the that their actions are largely unknown. the pact. As Obama said in 2009: beleaguered nuclear non-proliferation But today, the Treaty’s global nuclear test “After more than five decades of talks, system. At the 2010 conference to review monitoring system is now more than 85 it is time for the testing of nuclear the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, percent complete and is more capable weapons to finally be banned.” the 183 Member States unanimously than anticipated a decade ago. U.S. reaffirmed the vital importance of entry intelligence and test monitoring tools are This op-ed first appeared in The Christian into force of the CTBT “as a core element highly effective, as their rapid reporting Science Monitor on 20 February 2013. of the international nuclear disarmament on the North Korean test showed. and non-proliferation regime.” When the Treaty enters into force, Like any treaty-ratification effort, the U.S. and other States will have Biographical note securing Senate approval will be tough, an additional tool to deter potential THOMAS R. PICKERING but is within reach. The Senate’s approval testing: short-notice, on-site inspections served as U.S. Under Secretary of of the New START treaty (a nuclear arms to investigate any suspicious events. State for Political Affairs from 1997 reduction agreement between the U.S. With the Treaty in place, no would-be to 2000 and as the U.S. Ambassador and Russia) in December 2010 shows proliferator could be confident that a to the United Nations from 1989 to that the White House and the Senate nuclear explosion of any military utility 1992. In a diplomatic career spanning five decades, he also can work together when U.S. national would escape detection. served as U.S. Ambassador to the security interests are at stake. Russian Federation, India, Israel, El Nuclear proliferation Salvador, Nigeria, and the The case for the CTBT is stronger than is a threat to world Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. ever. Since the Treaty was last considered peace and security Ambassador Pickering is Chairman of the Board of the International in 1999, substantial investments in the Crisis Group and the American U.S. nuclear labs and scientific advances The Treaty can also be enforced by Academy of Diplomacy. in nuclear weapons science mean that we action from the UN Security Council. The

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 SpectruM iN THE APP StORE

ALL EDITIONS ON THE IPAD. SUBSCRIBE NOW FOR FREE. voices Wanted: An end to nuclear nationalism in South Asia But the public mood for peace needs international support

by ZIA MIAN, Research Scientist PRINCETON UNIVERSITY

Photo by Gudrun Georges. www.gudrungeorges.com

Since their back-to-back nuclear weapon 28 and 30 May 1998” and “demands that Pakistan and India appear to recognize no tests in May 1998, Pakistan and India India and Pakistan refrain from further international legal obligation to restrain have been rapidly developing and nuclear tests.” It also: or end their nuclear weapons and missile expanding their nuclear arsenals. While “Calls upon India and Pakistan programmes. They did, however, agree the two countries have maintained a immediately to stop their nuclear weapon bilaterally in 1999 that: “The two sides moratorium on nuclear testing, they development programmes, to refrain from shall continue to abide by their respective have refused to sign the Comprehensive weaponization or from the deployment of unilateral moratorium on conducting Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT). They are nuclear weapons, to cease development further nuclear test explosions unless both producing highly enriched uranium of ballistic missiles capable of delivering either side, in exercise of its national and plutonium—the key ingredients for nuclear weapons and any further sovereignty decides that extraordinary nuclear weapons—and increasing their production of fissile material for nuclear events have jeopardised its supreme production capacity. They are estimated weapons, to confirm their policies not to interests.” They also reached agreement in to have approximately 100 nuclear export equipment, materials or technology 2005 on advanced notification of ballistic weapons each and they are also testing that could contribute to weapons of missile flight tests. and deploying a diverse array of nuclear- mass destruction or missiles capable capable ballistic and cruise missiles. of delivering them and to undertake International concern has flared appropriate commitments in that regard.” during crises in South Asia. Most notably, UN resolution condemned during the three month-long India- 1998 nuclear tests Greater effort needed to Pakistan Kargil War in 1999 and the move Pakistan and India long military crisis of 2001-2002, when The headlong pursuit by Pakistan and towards nuclear restraint the two countries threatened the use of India of their nuclear weapon ambitions nuclear weapons. For the international flies in the face of a unanimous UN Having passed Resolution 1172, the community as a whole, in the decade Security Council resolution calling for United Nations Security Council and the since then the South Asian nuclear restraint in South Asia —Resolution 1172 larger international community has made arms race has taken a back seat to the (6 June 1998). The resolution “condemns no substantial effort to move Pakistan opportunities afforded by the emergence the nuclear tests conducted by India on and India towards nuclear restraint, to of India as a rising economic and strategic 11 and 13 May 1998 and by Pakistan on say nothing of nuclear disarmament. power in Asia and the importance

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 accorded Pakistan since September 2001 »In the wake of the May own Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty in supporting the war against Al-Qaeda 1998 nuclear tests, civil without waiting for a global treaty.” The and the Taliban in Afghanistan. These Convention also supported the demand opportunities have included massive society groups began to that “All states must commit themselves arms sales to the two countries. The 2012 focus more strongly on to cease production of additional fissile Stockholm International Peace Research materials for nuclear weapons and other Institute Yearbook reports that India was nuclear issues and the explosive purposes.” An end to the the largest arms importer in the world importance of banning production of fissile material would cap from 2007-2011 and Pakistan was the nuclear arsenals and help lay a basis for third largest importer for this period. further testing.« reducing and eliminating them.

Civil society: making thousands of activists working on peace In the wake of the May 1998 the case for peace and justice, women’s rights, human rights, nuclear tests, civil society groups began and cooperation and labour rights. It includes teachers to focus more strongly on nuclear issues and students, journalists, former soldiers, and the importance of banning further As Pakistan and India have lurched from scholars, business people, and retired testing. Sometimes this opposition to crisis to crisis and both governments government officials1. An important focus further nuclear testing came at great cost. poured scarce resources into a ruinous of this effort has been opposing further On 3 June 1998, at a press conference conventional and nuclear arms race, a India-Pakistan wars, reversing the arms organized in Islamabad by the Pakistan- growing number of activists in the two race and promoting a process of South India People’s Forum, leading Pakistani countries have mobilized to make the Asian nuclear disarmament. public intellectual Eqbal Ahmad and case for peace and cooperation. One prominent physicist and peace activist key group is the Pakistan-India People’s India and Pakistan should Abdul Hameed Nayyar were fiercely Forum for Peace and Democracy, which conclude their own denounced as traitors for speaking began in 1994 as a group of 25 people CTBT without waiting against the nuclear tests by some of the from the two countries meeting together for a global treaty journalists there to cover the event. They Photo by Gudrun Georges. www.gudrungeorges.com in Lahore, Pakistan. It organized its first were then physically attacked by a mob of convention in 1995 in New Delhi, which A ban on nuclear testing has been activists from an Islamist political party. brought together almost a hundred people a recurring demand of this citizens’ from each country. Since then, the annual diplomacy movement. The first In marked contrast, the governments convention has alternated between Pakistan-India Peoples' Convention on in both Pakistan and India offered Pakistan and India – when the respective Peace and Democracy, held in 1995, nuclear testing as a symbol of national governments have granted visas. agreed on a joint resolution that “India achievement. In both countries the nuclear and Pakistan should conclude their tests were announced on television This effort at people-to-people ______by the respective prime ministers. The diplomacy has grown to be the largest [1] These efforts are documented and assessed scientists responsible for carrying out in Smitu Kothari and Zia Mian eds., Bridging regular gathering of citizens of the two Partition: People's Initiatives for Peace between the nuclear tests were publicly feted as countries. The effort now embraces India and Pakistan, Orient Blackswan, 2010. national heroes. In Pakistan, the scientists

People speaking out against nuclear testing at a press conference in Islamabad in June 1998 were abused and then assaulted. Photo courtesy of Isa Daudpota.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 »As India seeks the capacity to put multiple nuclear warheads on missiles that can threaten

China, and Pakistan seeks compact nuclear Despite the public mood for peace weapons for use on the battlefield to counter between their countries, and the obvious and pressing need to direct greater Indian conventional forces, there will be resources to meet the basic social needs resistance in particular from the respective of their people, there is no sign that nuclear weapon complexes to sign the CTBT.« governments in Pakistan and India are ready to curb their nuclear build ups. As India seeks the capacity to put multiple were shown returning from the test site a demand for “No explosive testing, nuclear warheads on missiles that can in Balochistan and speaking at a live sub-critical testing, or production or threaten China, and Pakistan seeks press conference on national television. acquisition of fissile materials and tritium, compact nuclear weapons for use on the In India, there were glossy photos of for nuclear weapons purposes” by India. battlefield to counter Indian conventional scientists with Prime Minister Atal Behari forces, there will be resistance in particular Vajpayee at the test site in Rajasthan. This is only a small part of a largely from the respective nuclear weapon hidden history of local opposition to complexes to sign the CTBT. The votes On the first anniversary of the the nuclear future in South Asia2. This by both Pakistan and India at the United 1998 nuclear tests, dubbed the “Day history is being made by people far Nations General Assembly in support of of Deliverance,” Pakistan’s government removed from the corridors of national the CTBT are clearly at odds with these ordered 10 days of national celebrations. power and invisible in the great halls policies to develop their nuclear arsenals. National television and radio networks all where States meet to talk about arms But few other countries seem to care. carried programmes lauding the nuclear control and disarmament, war and tests. Cities and towns were decorated with peace. The sites of struggle are nuclear It is hard to see civil society in banners and posters of leading nuclear facilities, from uranium mines to nuclear Pakistan and India alone being able weapons scientists and Prime Minister power plants, at the nuclear weapon test to overcome the entrenched power of Nawaz Sharif against a backdrop of sites and the missile testing sites. Here the nuclear weapons complexes and mushroom clouds. Giant glowing models of local communities have fought back, the political forces that foster nuclear the mountain where the tests were carried trying to defend their livelihoods and nationalism in the two countries. Their out were erected in several cities. community rights, resisting displacement efforts would benefit greatly from and destruction of the environment, and determined efforts by the international Pakistan should sign demanding the basic rights of citizenship: community to confront Pakistan and the CTBT immediately the rights to know and to be heard. India over their nuclear weapons They have marched, fasted, blockaded, programmes. This task would of course be Civil society remained undaunted. A occupied, gone to court, and they have made much easier if the United States and national network of peace and justice protested to survive. other powers that have not yet ratified groups came together in Karachi to the CTBT were to do so and if they were establish the Pakistan Peace Coalition in PUBLIC MOOD FOR PEACE to take more seriously their long evaded January 1999. Its founding statement obligation to nuclear disarmament. called on Pakistan’s people and The public mood has shifted. Despite the government to: wars and the hostility, and the decades of Biographical note “Recognise that nuclear war is not just an being taught that the other was a mortal abstract possibility but something very enemy, the people of India and Pakistan ZIA MIaN real. Pakistan and India must enter into say they are ready for peace. A 2012 directs the Project on Peace and negotiations on nuclear issues, initially with public opinion poll conducted by the Pew Security in South Asia at Princeton the aim of creating confidence-building Research Center found that more than 60 University's Program on Science and Global Security and teaches at measures to decrease the chances of percent of people in Pakistan and India Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School the accidental use, but with complete want better relations between the two of Public and International Affairs. denuclearisation as the ultimate goal. countries, with 67 percent in Pakistan His work focuses on nuclear Pakistan should sign the CTBT immediately.” and 58 percent in India supporting peace weapons and nuclear energy issues, talks. About 80 percent in Pakistan and especially in South Asia. He is co-editor of Science & Global India’s national Campaign for Nuclear 60 percent in India think it is “very Security, the international technical Disarmament and Peace, founded in 2000, important” for the two countries to journal of arms control, non- which brings together over 200 grass resolve their differences over Kashmir. proliferation and disarmament roots groups, called for the “halt and roll science and co-deputy chair of the ______back [of] India’s nuclear weapons-related International Panel on Fissile [2] see Smitu Kothari and Zia Mian eds., Out of the Materials (IPFM). preparations and activities.” This included Nuclear Shadow, Zed Press, 2001.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 COMPREHENSIVE NUCLEAR-TEST-BAN TREATY: sciencE AND Technology 2 13CONFERENCE

CTBT: Science and Technology 2013 Conference (SnT2013) from 17-21 June was the fourth in a series of conferences that help establish interactions and partnerships between the scientific and technological community and the CTBTO.

Download all videos and presentations at ctbto.org/snt2013

oral presentations poster presentations conference + made by scientists + at the conference 80 250 750 + participants

WITH THE GENEROUS SUPPORT OF THE REPUBLIC OF AUSTRIA MEDIA SPONSOR: SNT 2 13 in pictures

1: Dance and Drumming Group Afrococo Performing at the opening ceremony of the Conference. 2: the Musikgymnasium Vienna choir performing at the Opening Ceremony of the Conference. 3: Panel discussion with Patricia Lewis, Research Director for International Security, Chatham House (centre) Siegfried Hecker, Center for International Security and Cooperation, Stanford University (right), and MICHEL MIRAILLET, Director for Strategy Affairs and Defense Policy, French Ministry of Defense (left). 4: Participants in the poster exhibition area.

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»By engaging the scientific community in strengthening its own abilities, the CTBTO advances its vital work of preventing and deterring further nuclear tests…I renew my call for the entry into force of the CTBT.«

Ban Ki-moon, UN Secretary-General, in a video message to the Conference. 3

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CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 5: press conference with keynote speakers: Ellen Tauscher, former U.S. Under Secretary of State for Arms Control and International Security Affairs (left), and Hans Blix, former head of the IAEA. 6: Nadezda Tsybulskaya from the A. M. Obukhov Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Russian Academy of Sciences, making her presentation. 7: Lassina Zerbo, CTBTO Executive Secretary-elect (left) and Jean-Michel Vanderhofstadt, CEO-General Manager, Institute for Radio Elements, signing a Memorandum of Understanding on cooperation in noble gas mitigation. 8: Grosser redoutensaal, hofburg palace, vienna.

»You stand for those who promote science for human security. Instead of building and improving the nuclear bomb, you are devising ways and means of controlling it through global cooperation.«

Michael Linhart, Secretary General, Austrian Federal Ministry for European and International Affairs, addressing scientists during the Opening Ceremony.

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»The Science and Technology conference series is a process; it provides an opportunity to integrate results of scientific research into operation to improve the CTBT verification regime.«

Lassina Zerbo, CTBTO Executive Secretary-elect and Project Executive for the Conference.

8 15 Photos courtesy of Marianne Weiss Photography CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 INTERVIEW Face to Face with CTBTO Executive Secretary Tibor Tóth Looking back, looking forward

Tibor Tóth addressing UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and other high-level dignitaries attending the CTBTO's 15th anniversary celebrations in Vienna, Austria, on 17 February 2012.

What is your first memory of nuclear that this experience propelled me into knowledge, but also the longer weapons? How did it impact you at the nuclear arms control from the age historical perspective of ups and many time – and later in life? of eight, it has reminded me in later downs. For example, I had the chance years that the Cuban Missile Crisis to follow the activities of the Group As a general introduction to this was not an abstract historical event of Scientific Experts (GSE) in Geneva, interview let me say that I personally like that just happened there, then and to the forerunner of an effort to design a history, but I do not like personal history. them – and that we might be wrong system to monitor the future test-ban Whenever someone looks backwards it in assuming that something like this treaty. Although the GSE actually distracts the focus from the road ahead. could never happen again. started out a couple of years earlier, in the late 1970s, the CTBT was only However, my first vivid How did you first become involved concluded in 1996. For me this serves recollection of the nuclear threat professionally in nuclear arms as a reminder of the required time was a doomsday-like discussion with control issues? frame for some of these efforts. my family at the dining table. I was around eight years old at the time and I started my career in 1977 with You have devoted a large part of your did not understand too many of the the Hungarian Foreign Ministry life to these issues. How would you details. Only decades later could I date where I dealt initially with European analyse the current situation against a this memory back to the October 1962 security and cooperation known as historical background? Cuban Missile Crisis and understand the Helsinki Process. My interest in how close the world had come to arms control began with a six-month I have been dealing throughout my nuclear annihilation during those UN Disarmament Fellowship in career with the whole spectrum of fateful days. The gloomy feeling at the 1980. It fascinated me how in arms global issues within the UN system, family dining table – and probably at control, policy is intertwined with with the exception of trade, starting as all dining tables around the world – is very technical issues; I had some a deputy attaché in Geneva and later as best described by what Jacqueline limited exposure to the latter through ambassador in Geneva, Vienna and The Kennedy told her husband John F. chemistry and physics at secondary Hague. But weapons of mass destruction Kennedy at the height of the crisis: “I school. During the fellowship, I saw issues have provided the real learning would like to die next to you, and the all the major disarmament fora, and curve about how much time and children do too.” While I don’t claim gained not just theoretical and practical perseverance is needed for these efforts

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 to succeed. I’ve spent 15 years of my You were one of the first office-holders at What have been the key technical and career dealing with the regulation of the newly established CTBTO when you political developments relating to the CTBT chemical weapons, another 15 years were appointed Chairperson of Working since it opened for signature in 1996? with biological weapons, and 17 years Group A for administrative and financial of my professional career concerned issues. What memories do you have? In a nutshell: We managed to push the with nuclear weapons. If I try to apply nuclear test genie back into the bottle. what I have seen in these fields to the We literally started from scratch Before the CTBT, there were on average whole area of multilateralism, I think back in March 1997. In order to draft four to five hundred nuclear weapon it really boils down to regulation: the organization’s first programme tests every decade. They were both how much regulation is enough, and budget, I had to find a box to political and environmental pollutants. and where a regulation deficit might put the computer on, look for a This decade, there have only been be a problem. There are parallels to chair and organize a secretary. I three – still, three unfortunate nuclear other areas of multilateralism such as admit that our first draft programme tests too many. One hundred and economic governance. The commonality and budget (P&B) bore a striking eighty-three countries have thrown is that in different areas the lack of similarity to the IAEA’s P&B; with their political and moral weight behind cooperation through regulation, a its multi-layered programmatic the no-test norm. We have built a “free-for-all” approach, might be approach it was a bit of an overkill system unprecedented not only in critical and even lead to disasters over for an organization that was just reach but also in complexity: Both time – a major recession, in the case of starting up. But we got off to a the basic monitoring technologies– economics. For nuclear arms control, flying start, and in record time we seismic, infrasound, hydroacoustic, we have to ask ourselves: Do we have succeeded in putting in place all of radionuclide and noble gas – as well as a sufficient and sustainable level of the key financial and administrative the support technologies– atmospheric cooperative security versus open ended regulations, which enabled the transport modelling, information and competition? And there is the time organization to run smoothly. This communication, could each function as factor, too: Are we moving at the right was really the administrative/legal independent global systems. Together, pace if we want to reduce over 17,000 glue for everything else that we have they constitute a system of systems. nuclear weapons to global zero? done since then. And with on-site inspections, you have

Tibor Tóth addressing participants attending the Advanced Science Course in Vienna, Austria, 28 November 2011. Tibor Tóth addressing the audience at the Reykjavik event in New York,USA, 27 September 2012.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 Besides enlarging the pool of CTBT experts, we have reached out to new audiences, to universities around the »Our monitoring network has world. Just a month ago we hosted an increased from around 80 to event with representatives from more than 30 universities, not just from nearly 300 stations since 2005, the United States or Europe but from so around 90% of all our assets all corners of the world. Participants included professors who are educating are in place, despite all of the the future leaders. We are reaching out challenges we’ve encountered.« to countries which we could not reach otherwise and in 2012 we trained four times as many experts as people who work at the organization.

an additional layer of verification to the other 159 countries that have Multilateral security has muscle, a cluster of another one ratified the Treaty to convince the become a business as complex as dozen technologies with sub-sets of remaining eight. The only country piloting an aircraft. It’s extremely technologies. that can convince the United States important that our future leaders is the United States itself; even if have the right level of understanding What effect do you think ratification by the U.S. ratifies, the only one to about how complex this world is the United States will have on other hold convince China is China, the only with the volume and the velocity of out states? country to convince India is India, changes which are forever increasing. and so on. Again, we need patience Let me come back to the parallels and perseverance. Take a look at Why is gender balance important in of security and economic policies. the issue of chemical weapons: the international organizations? How has If country ‘A’ tries to maximize its first time they were discussed was the CTBTO helped to promote gender financial and trade advantages at the in St. Petersburg in 1868, while the equality during your tenure? What expense of country ‘B’, it must ask Chemical Weapons Convention only remains to be done? itself, “Could it lead to less prosperity entered into force in 1997 and still for me as well? Is this a sustainable we are only 80% through with the I coined the phrase “security is too solution for my own well-being?” destruction of chemical weapons important to be left just to men.” I think There are striking similarities stockpiles. The only question is how it’s important that we bring on board as between unilateral protectionism in much additional time leased from many women as possible. I don’t think the economic fields and nuclear arms our future do we have and will we be the fact that this is an organization races, be it globally or regionally. given the luxury of spending another dealing with highly technical issues is 50 years without a 21st Century an acceptable excuse not to do so. Yes, Most, if not all of the eight equivalent of the Cuban missile crisis? it is true that the percentage of women missing countries are in the Asian- applicants for some of the technical Pacific and Middle Eastern regions, What importance do you attach to jobs is less than 10%. But I am proud where the world’s political hotspots disarmament education? that now one-third of our professional can be found. A deficit in regulation, colleagues are women. I am proud of in cooperative norms between My experience of being introduced the fact that two of my five deputies are countries, is characteristic for these to this issue through a disarmament women. But a lot remains to be done. regions in the field of security policy. fellowship programme at the very In order to increase the percentage of An absence of insurance policies, beginning of my career was an women applying for technical jobs, and if you will. So each of the eight eye-opener. We have to think about following a “double up” pledge I made countries should ask itself whether the future and reach out early on International Women’s Day on 8 the absence of cooperative norms enough to those who will be pushing March 2012, the organization trained in the field of nuclear weapons for arms control regulations in the in just one year the same number of testing is beneficial to its own long- years to come. Through the CTBTO’s women as there are people working in term security. They should ask of Capacity Development Initiative, the organization through the CTBTO’s themselves whether the Cuban missile we’ve trained and educated station Capacity Development Initiative. crisis was an event which happened operators, National Data Centre “there, then and to them” but it staff, diplomats and other experts How has the CTBTO evolved since you cannot happen “here, now and to involved in the Treaty, hundreds of became its Executive Secretary in 2005? us.” I firmly believe that it’s not up them in 2012 alone. What would you consider the biggest

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 challenge you have encountered and your qualitatively, with the integration of return to our member states and their greatest achievement? the new infrasound component and citizens on their enormous investment including noble gas systems in our in this organization and its monitoring I’d answer the first question with one routine operations; the number of system at the difficult moments of the phrase: “coming of age.” The organization operational systems has increased Great East Japan earthquake, tsunami was eight years old when I took over; during this time from eight to 30. We and the subsequent melt-down of the it will soon be 17 years old. It’s very have found new ways of processing Fukushima nuclear power plant. similar to watching a young child grow data, of improving the reliability and up and approach adulthood, becoming quality of data products, and of making So the message is that more self-confident, more mature. I think all data available in near real-time to all-inclusive multilateralism is not a this is the best way to describe how the our 183 Member States. This is now a passé matter. The other way around: organization has evolved. one billion dollar monitoring system it is very much alive and is the way to supported by 4,000 people working go in the future, if done correctly. I’m A challenging period was from around the globe and around the clock. extremely proud of this organization’s 2006 to 2008, when the CTBTO This is a joint venture, unprecedented track record in this regard. It is underwent fundamental restructuring. not just in size, complexity, and the multilateralism at its best.

»This is a joint venture, unprecedented not just in size, complexity, and the way in which all of the elements work in synergy but also in terms of all-inclusiveness: all-inclusive data gathering, transmission, processing and sharing of all the benefits.«

Also, due to the tenure limitation, I had way in which all of the elements to replace all the professional staff after work in synergy but also in terms of seven years of service. While it was all-inclusiveness: all-inclusive data possible to negotiate a certain degree of gathering, transmission, processing and flexibility for the tenure limitation, both sharing of all the benefits. these issues caused a lot of upheaval for the organization and, of course, stress I think that multilateral processes for the individuals concerned. could take inspiration from this Biographical note arrangement. There was a lot of Then in 2006, the CTBTO had to soul-searching after the sobering TIBOR TÓTH react to the first nuclear test by the United Nations Copenhagen Climate has served as the Executive Secretary of the CTBTO since 2005 and will Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Change Conference in 2009. One of remain in that position until 31 July the first of three unfortunate tests for the explanations offered was that such 2013. He has been actively involved in the verification system, but it passed conferences do not work because there international disarmament and each test with flying colours. On top of are simply too many players around non-proliferation issues for over three that, the shortfall in contributions by the table. At the CTBTO with its near decades. From 1990 to 1993 and from 2003 to 2005, he was the Ambassador one major contributor caused serious universal membership, we have proven and Permanent Representative of financial problems. the opposite. We have built, managed, Hungary to the UN in Geneva and to operated and improved an incredibly the UN in Vienna from 1997 to 2001. In terms of achievements, our complex system. And we have run it From 1996 to 2004 he served as monitoring network has increased from efficiently not just from a technical Chairperson of the CTBTO’s Working Group dealing with budgetary and around 80 to nearly 300 stations since and management standpoint but also administrative matters. He chaired the 2005, so around 90% of all our assets politically with the support of our Biological Weapons Convention are in place, despite all of the challenges Member States, for example, by reacting negotiations on an implementation and we’ve encountered. Monitoring jointly to challenges such as the DPRK verification regime from 1992 to 2004. capabilities have also improved nuclear tests. And we provided the right

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 This word cloud depicts the frequency with which words have been mentioned in the book of abstracts (for the Science and Technology 2013 Conference): the larger the font, the more common the word.

Created using wordle (www.wordle.net)

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 Status of certified IMS Facilities

ALLED AL as of 12 JUly 2013 CERTIFIEDINST UNDER CONSPLANNEDTRUCTIONTOT 275 20 19 23 337

MORE Google Map Features

Various new interactive features have recently been added to all the world maps on our website, including:

PDF MAP CREATOR which allows you to create a printable colour version of the signature/ratification maps on a global and regional basis.

PDF REPORTS which provides a comprehensive breakdown of the map that was selected

Visit online: www.ctbto.org/map

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 VERIFICATION SCIENCE with Paul Richards INTERVIEW Special Research Scientist, Columbia University Seismic Detective Work: CTBTO monitoring system ‘very effective’ in detecting North Korea’s third nuclear test

Upgrading the CTBTO's auxiliary seismic station AS02 at Ushuaia, Argentina. Photo courtesy of Owen Kilgour.

On 12 February 2013 the Democratic What do the seismic data tell us about it is the first to arrive; they can all People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) the approximate size of the yield? generate a secondary type of wave announced that it had conducted its third (or S-wave); and they can all generate nuclear test. Based on seismic monitoring We can tell from comparison with the so-called surface waves that arrive data provided to CTBTO Member States by signals recorded in May 2009 that last. But the efficiency of generation of the International Data Centre (IDC), other this latest explosion was about 2.5 these waves is distinctively different data, and your own analysis, how to 3 times larger in yield, but this is a between earthquakes and explosions. confident are you that this was indeed a relative measure and there is greater For example, using data of the quality nuclear test? What do the data tell you uncertainty in estimating an absolute recorded from earthquakes and and what conclusions can you draw? size. In absolute terms, I would expect explosions, large and small, that have the yield to lie somewhere in the range occurred in East Asia since the 1980s The data from more than a hundred from about 5 to 15 kilotons. (when wide access to high-quality data seismographic stations indicate that this began), we know that P-waves are most was an explosion, conducted in North How do seismic waves generated by an efficiently generated by explosions, and Korea at a location very similar to that of earthquake differ to those caused by an S-waves by earthquakes. Furthermore, a previous explosion ‒ the one on 25 May explosion? What was significant with this these differences are accentuated when 2009. I was impressed at the number of particular event? we focus on the higher-frequency stations that recorded signals, as reported content of the recorded signals. With by the IDC and also by the United States Different seismic sources ‒ such as surface waves, some features of the Geological Survey. earthquakes, landslides, explosions in signals are seen only for seismic sources the ocean, atmospheric explosions, and that are very shallow ‒ say, less than It is not possible to tell from underground explosions ‒ all generate two or three kilometres, which is the seismograms alone that a recorded a mix of different types of seismic case for almost all explosions but is rare explosion is nuclear or is a chemical waves. Furthermore, each type of for earthquakes. Other surface-wave explosion in which all the explosive seismic wave can be recorded across a features are more commonly seen for material is fired at the same time. Such range of frequencies. In practice, from earthquakes than explosions. single-fired chemical explosions do studies of recordings from thousands occasionally occur ‒ at small size. But the of seismic events, the mix of different The above is but a short summary explosions in North Korea have been large. seismic waves is diagnostic of the type of the fact that there is a long list of If not nuclear they would have required the of seismic source that generated them. different features in seismic waves that simultaneous firing of thousands of tons of can be used to discriminate between chemicals, which would have to have been For example, earthquakes and earthquakes and explosions; and there assembled clandestinely to generate the explosions all generate the fastest is also a substantial infrastructure of signals we have recorded. Thus an origin type of seismic wave, called the regional, national, and international other than nuclear is not plausible. primary wave (or P-wave) because agencies that routinely acquire

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 seismograms and analyse them for purposes of characterizing the different »To a remarkable degree the types of seismic event. seismograms generated by the 12 To a remarkable degree the February 2013 event had features seismograms generated by the 12 February that repeated what was observed 2013 event had features that repeated what was observed from North Korea's second from North Korea's second underground test except that signals were underground test except that significantly larger than those recorded previously. This similarity indicates that the signals were significantly larger third and second tests were conducted in than those recorded previously.« almost the same location.

When complete, the seismic network of the International Monitoring System The United States Geological Survey (USGS) opportunity to provide a magnitude (IMS) will comprise 170 stations. More measured the event in the DPRK on 12 that could become authoritative. The than 90% of these stations are already February 2013 as 5.1 in magnitude whereas USGS typically can use more stations up and running. How effective have IMS the CTBTO’s International Data Centre (IDC) ‒ and the International Seismological stations been in detecting events such as measured it as 4.9. Could you explain why Centre (ISC) based in the UK can use the three nuclear tests announced by the there are different magnitude scales? even more ‒ but the stations used by DPRK? the USGS and the ISC change from These two agencies use a different set year to year and even more from They are very effective, in the sense that of stations, and analyse their signals decade to decade, which in a sense signals from key stations had large signals in slightly different ways, so it is not means that their magnitude scale (well above the level of background surprising that their measurements result changes slightly as new stations are noise) and were promptly available to in slightly different magnitude values. added and some are closed (or are analysts. Even if the explosion had been operated with new equipment). hundreds of times smaller, in my opinion The IDC works with a fixed its signals would have been detected and set of primary and auxiliary seismic In my opinion it would be very appropriately characterized as coming stations. As these two networks worthwhile for the IDC to make the effort from an explosion. near completion, the IDC has the to provide magnitude measurements based upon generally-agreed procedures and using a fixed station-set with stations (of the IMS) that are operated according to fixed procedures.

The seismic data registered by the CTBTO's How confident are you that the IMS monitoring stations help would detect an explosion with a yield of define the area to be searched under an on-site less than one kiloton and would an inspection (OSI). This explosion smaller than that be of any area has been set at a maximum of 1000 km². military significance? The ellipses on the map show the location estimates of the 2006 I am confident that the IMS would (green), 2009 (purple) detect an explosion in North Korea well and 2013 (red) declared nuclear tests by North below one kiloton, because that part Korea. The CTBTO located of the world is monitored very well the 12 February event to within an area of 181km². indeed. However, even in that region (red ellipses). there is some level of yield below which Once the CTBT has entered into force, an monitoring becomes uncertain. It is the OSI can be carried out goal of monitoring organizations to drive to search on site for any evidence of a nuclear that level down so far that militarily explosion. significant activities are inhibited. The question you are asking here raises many different issues especially if it is asked without reference to any specific country (such as DPRK). I participated in a U.S.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 National Academy of Sciences study In addition to its primary mandate of (2) these influences, which include on technical issues related to the CTBT detecting nuclear explosions, what other the exact time of arrival, the signal and I support the findings of the report, civil and scientific applications can amplitude, and even the detailed which was released in March 2012. The seismic data offer? shape of a seismic wave, can be report concluded that ‘the status of U.S. regarded as potential information national monitoring and the International A complete answer to this question that must first be extracted in a Monitoring System has improved to levels would be extremely long, because quantitative way from the recorded better than predicted in 1999.’ seismic data have so many different signals; and uses. In my experience, even Which technological developments are seismologists are often not aware (3) the information must then be allowing scientists to improve their of the breadth of human activities interpreted to enable estimates analyses of seismic events? that engage with, and sometimes to be made, for example, on the depend upon, seismic data. There are thickness and composition of the The archives of seismograms that communities of users of the raw data layers in the Earth through which are gradually built up by stations (the seismograms themselves), and the signals have passed. In this way, that have been operated for a period then a far larger set of communities seismologists first discovered the of years (in some cases, more than that use data products such as thickness of the crust in different two decades), are turning out to be a bulletins of seismicity. Here, I shall regions, plus features in the vicinity resource for improvements in detecting emphasize the former applications. of the core-mantle boundary, and and analysing the signals from small features associated with the Earth's seismic events occurring today. The Those who use seismograms inner core. This knowledge continues relevant technological developments directly include researchers who to be refined. here are in computing capability and study features of the Earth's crust, the management of large databases, mantle and core. The fundamental Amazingly, it appears that the including the ability to search for and ideas behind such work are that: inner core at the centre of the Earth, extract signals from seismic events in which is largely composed of solid the past that occurred in the vicinity (1) seismic waves are influenced iron and is comparable in size to the of a current event. It is going to be by the material in our planet Moon, is slowly moving with respect important to manage the growth of through which they have to the rest of the solid Earth, in a seismogram archives effectively, so that travelled in their path from the fashion which is driven by the same signals recorded today can be easily seismic source (typically, an processes that generate the Earth's used in future decades, for purposes earthquake or an explosion) to magnetic field. of interpreting the signals that will be the station where the signals recorded then by the same stations. are recorded;

By 14 February 2013, a total of 96 CTBTO monitoring stations had detected the unusual seismic event in North Korea on 12 February 2013. The first data generated by the stations were made available to CTBTO Member States in less than two hours, and before North Korea announced that it had conducted a nuclear test.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 On 12 January 2010, a 7.0 magnitude earthquake struck near Port au Prince, Haiti’s capital city, claiming between 230,000 and 300,000 lives and leaving 1.5 million people homeless. The study of seismograms from such damaging events enable scientists to learn how much slip occurred between opposite faces on the causative faults whose fracture generated the waves recorded all around the world. Screen shot from NASA WorldWind software of NW Caribbean area.

Original seismograms are also tsunami, or the arrival of strong used by scientists who are interested in shaking that could damage trains and making estimates of the overall extent prevent deliveries of electrical power. of faulting that underlies each large Such programmes, delivering vital earthquake. Such natural events can information to enable preparation, be the most devastating phenomena require prompt assessment of strong influencing the life and health of seismic signals from near their point millions of people, as we have seen of origination, and then conveying with earthquakes at the magnitude 9 a characterization of the potentially level offshore Sumatra (Indonesia) in damaging waves that could damage December 2004, and offshore Japan in structures at greater distance. March 2011. Even earthquakes with far less energy can be devastating, as was Users of bulletins of seismicity found in December 2003 in Bam (Iran); include thousands of scientists and in October 2005 in Kashmir; in May engineers engaged in fault mapping 2008 in Sichuan (China); and in January and in general studies of seismic 2010 in Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The study hazard, for broad regions as well as Biographical note of seismograms from such damaging for specific locales where there is events enable scientists to learn how the need for guidance on the degree PAUL RICHARDS much slip occurred between opposite of resistance to earthquake ground is a Special Research Scientist at faces on the causative faults whose motions that must be built into new Columbia University, USA, where he fracture generated the waves recorded structures, or perhaps to be achieved was a professor from 1971 to 2008. all around the world. And, most by retro-fitting old buildings. The He co-authored an advanced text in seismology in 1980 (translated into importantly, this work enables estimates general point here is that hundreds Russian, Chinese, and Japanese), still to be made of the likely time scale for of earthquakes are documented each in print (2nd edition 2002). He has such earthquakes to be repeated. day around the world; and basic researched methods of explosion and information on where and when they earthquake monitoring since the New programmes are being occurred, and how big they could mid-1980s, has written about 40 professional papers on these developed to improve emergency be at different levels of probability, subjects, and spent two separate management, in real time, as soon as a is the starting point for numerous years in U.S. government service (on large earthquake is detected, with the quantitative studies in geology and leave from academia) working on general goal of providing information the physics of earthquakes; in the technical issues of nuclear explosion as soon as possible to those who assessment of risk to large structures; monitoring and test ban negotiations. might be affected by a soon-to-arrive and in the design of building codes.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 VERIFICATION SCIENCE Detection of radioactive gases consistent with North Korean test underlines strength of CTBTO monitoring system

Forward Atmospheric Transport Modelling showed that the radionuclides could have come from the North Korean test site.

What was detected? In addition, CTBTO Member When the network is complete, half States in the region were consulted and of the CTBTO’s 80 planned radionuclide On 8 and 9 April 2013, significant quantities helped to exclude other sources, such stations will be equipped to detect of airborne radioactivity were detected as a leak from a nuclear installation. radioactive noble gases, in addition to by the CTBTO’s radionuclide station in radioactive particles. Of the 66 radionuclide Takasaki, Japan. Additional, smaller Why was the detection stations installed so far, 30 have noble gas detections were made between 12 and 14 made so long after the capabilities, compared to only 11 in 2006. April by another station in Ussuriysk, announced nuclear test? Russia. The detections consisted of the Why could the radioa ctivity radioactive noble gas xenon. The isotopes The observations indicate that the not have come from the in question — xenon-131m and xenon- radioactive gases had initially been Fukushima power plant? 133 — are typical fission products of contained in the test tunnel, and were plutonium or uranium and therefore used released instantaneously around 7 April The combination and concentration of the as indicators of a nuclear explosion. 2013 – for reasons unknown. A more two radionuclides that were detected by usual scenario for underground nuclear the Takasaki station were very different Why could the radioactivity explosions is that radioactive gases may to what one would expect to see from have come from the DPRK gradually seep through cracks to the Fukushima more than two years after the nuclear test site? surface, a process known as venting, accident. ATM calculations also pointed possibly leading to an earlier detection. to a source to the west of Takasaki, while The detection of radioactivity at Takasaki Fukushima and other Japanese nuclear was made 55 days after the announced This was the case after the 2006 facilities in the area are predominantly east nuclear test by North Korea on 12 February North Korean announced nuclear test, of the station. 2013. The station is located at around 1,000 when traces of xenon-133 were detected kilometres, or 620 miles, from the North two weeks later at a station in Yellowknife, What does the detection say Korean test site. The noble gases that were Canada. Lassina Zerbo, Director of the about the DPRK’s nuclear detected provided us with information International Data Centre explained: “The weapons programme? about the nature and timing of a nuclear detections in 2006 and 2013, from which event. By using atmospheric transport the Atmospheric Transport Modelling “The detection doesn’t indicate the type modelling (ATM), the calculation of the gave us an indication that they came from of fissile material used because nuclear three-dimensional travel path of airborne the Korean peninsula, say that we had fission happened a long time ago. In particles or gases, the North Korean nuclear one isotope in 2006 and two isotopes in order to be able to distinguish between test site was found to be a possible source. 2013, with a higher concentration. This is uranium and plutonium, it is preferable “According to the Austrian Meteorological probably because we have a station that to have a good sample much earlier. Agency, ZAMG, which performed high is much closer to the peninsula or within With these detected xenon isotopes the resolution ATM calculations, there is a the peninsula, that detected at a higher difference in ratio between uranium and perfect match with our models and the concentration, as opposed to 2006, where plutonium based fission is so small that timing of the [12 February] event,” CTBTO we had a detection 7,000 kilometres away the differentiation cannot be made after radionuclide expert Mika Nikkinen said. from the potential source.” such a long time,” Nikkinen said.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 VERIFICATION SCIENCE The noble gas releases from Fukushima Some implications and reflections

by Anders AND Anders Axelsson Ringbom

The Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant after it was struck by the tsunami on 11 March 2011. Photo courtesy of Air Photo Service Co. Ltd., Japan.

The tsunami caused by the large xenon contained in the nuclear reactor releases and their aftermath can underwater earthquake close to the was released. After a few weeks the prompt several interesting points of north-east coast of Japan on 11 entire northern hemisphere contained discussion regarding the design of March 2011 resulted in large releases radioxenon concentrations about 1,000 the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban of radionuclides from the Fukushima times above the normal background Treaty (CTBT) monitoring network, Daiichi nuclear power plant in the level2. It should be pointed out that the incorporated technologies, the days that followed. Particle-borne atmospheric radioxenon concentrations use of the data and future lines of radionuclides like Cs-137 and I-131, as at that level are still insignificant from a development for technology and data well as noble gas isotopes like Xe-133 human health perspective. use. In this article we will address some (see fact box on page 30) were released of these issues, focusing in particular on into the Earth’s atmosphere. Based on The estimated total release of the noble gas component of the IMS. measurements from the Preparatory Xe-133 exceeded 1019 Bq3. This is Commission for the Comprehensive one of the largest radioxenon releases How noble gases differ Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization’s in history, even exceeding the release from other radionuclides International Monitoring System (IMS) in from Chernobyl in 1986. As a source combination with atmospheric transport of noble gases, the Fukushima accident The key property that makes noble modelling (ATM)1, several research corresponds to an atmospheric nuclear gases different from other radionuclide groups have estimated that all of the explosion of 1 megaton. The design releases is the fact that they do not criterion for the IMS is 1 kiloton , react chemically with surrounding ______or 1,000 times less. Nevertheless, material. This means, for instance, [1]Atmospheric Transport Modelling (ATM) consideration of the Fukushima that they are difficult to contain in an is the calculation of the travel and underground nuclear test and will not dispersion of radionuclides released into the atmosphere, using meteorological ______be washed down by precipitation. The data. This calculation can be performed [2]On a global scale, the background is dominated latter property was also well illustrated in two ways: by releases from medical isotope production by the Fukushima accident, resulting •As backtracking ATM, which identifies facilities, locally, the background can be the area from which radionuclides may strongly influenced by releases from nuclear in a very even distribution of Xe-133 have been released, calculated from the reactors and from hospitals. observed by the IMS network a few location where they were observed. [3]A Becquerel (Bq) is the amount of radioactive weeks after the accident. All stations • As forward ATM, which identifies material in which 1 atom decays every second. where radionuclides may travel from 1 milli-Becquerel (mBq) = 10**-3 Bq in the northern hemisphere measured their known point of release. 1 micro-Becquerel (uBq) = 10**-6 Bq very similar concentrations. This can

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 is now complete and equipped with these very sensitive measurement systems. A common way to represent the measurement capability of this network is to estimate the average number of stations that would detect a nominal explosion-size release of radionuclides from each point on the planet. This notion of coverage indeed captures an essential feature of the network. However, in judging how well the radionuclide network fulfills its part of the CTBT verification mission, one also needs to consider under which circumstances detections are most likely to be useful. These include possibilities for determining the source location and time of an event and the ability to distinguish it from detections that are not relevant to the CTBT, such as noble gas emissions by the radiopharmaceutical industry.

From this point of view, the releases from Fukushima constituted an enormous, if temporary, increase in background. To what extent was the effectiveness of the noble gas network hampered? The question is interesting both on a measurement level and on a data evaluation level. In fact, the noble gas detection systems responded very well to the impact of the Fukushima radiation releases. Apart from the very first samples measured at the IMS station in Takasaki, Japan, Figure 1: (the station located closest to the Approximate distribution of the atmospheric activity concentration of the noble gas isotope 133Xe and the particle-borne radionuclide 137Cs on 30 March 2011, almost three weeks after the massive earthquake in Japan. The maps were obtained by Fukushima Daiichi power plant which interpolating data collected by the IMS radionuclide network. Note the homogenous distribution of xenon in the upper panel. The was hit by the largest concentrations maps illustrate only the main features of the activity concentration, and should not be used to draw any quantitative conclusions for any specific geographic locations. In particular, the xenon concentration did not reach as far south as illustrated by the upper map. of radionuclides), it was possible to use the data generated by the station to obtain accurate concentration values – even at such high levels – after appropriate corrections had been made. be compared to the distribution of a from Fukushima. The development particle-borne nuclide like Cs-137, of the measurement systems that On a measurement level, the strong which had a more inhomogeneous spatial made this possible started some 15 global signature of the Fukushima activity distribution (see Figure 1). years ago within the framework of releases reminds us of the need to the so-called International Noble overcome the so-called “memory effect” Key role of noble gas Gas Experiment (INGE) which was by which the measurement of a sample detection systems set up in 1999 to test the measuring in systems using plastic scintillator of radioactive noble gases in the detectors such as the SAUNA and ARIX Had the event occurred ten years atmosphere (see page 31). Of the 80 systems (see page 31) containing a earlier, before the IMS was equipped IMS radionuclide stations foreseen in high amount of radioxenon activity will with noble gas detection systems, it the Treaty, 40 are to have additional degrade the sensitivity of subsequent would have been impossible to obtain a noble gas detection capabilities. More measurements for some time. Recent global picture of the noble gas releases than 75% of the noble gas network advances in the surface treatment

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 of detector cells (i.e. reducing the amount of radioactivity retained by the detector from previous measurements) promise to radically shorten or totally eliminate this recovery time following the measurement of a sample with a high concentration.

Knowledge of radioxenon background levels is essential

On a network response level, the experience highlights the need to understand and discriminate against background from non-explosion radioxenon sources such as nuclear power plants and radiopharmaceutical production facilities. The latter type of background source constitutes the greater problem, both in terms of released amounts (obviously, Fukushima is an exception) and, more seriously, released signatures: the short irradiations used in medical isotope production can produce radioxenon with isotopic ratios similar to those produced in a nuclear explosion. The solution lies partly in improved source location to screen out known background sources, and partly in mapping and understanding Map of Japan showing the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant. specific background sources as well as generic background in various identify nuclear explosions as part one nuclide to another. Thus, regions of the world. The use of of a global network of monitoring simultaneously detecting and mobile or transportable radioxenon stations incorporating a number of quantifying two or more radioxenon detection equipment in various technologies. The optimal use of isotopes will be considerably more campaigns around the world for this data from all relevant technologies valuable than the simple detection purpose has been highly successful embodies the concept of data fusion, of only one. There are examples and is expected to continue to yield which is increasingly discussed today. of detections of other radioxenon valuable knowledge to improve It is evident that while seismic signals sources only a few weeks after the background discrimination. would be the preferred primary Fukushima accident, which could be source of location information identified despite high background The next generation of pertaining to an event, the usefulness concentrations. However, sensitivity detection systems of radionuclide detections in is not the only parameter of interest. demonstrating the nuclear character Given an ambient concentration of The experience that is being of that event depends on how radionuclides around a station, the accumulated from operating well the source region of detected more air that is sampled, the better a global network of sampling radionuclides can be defined. the detection sensitivity, but sampling stations can now be used to design more air takes more time. However, a next generation of detection Obviously, the sensitivity the time resolution of a measurement systems, which will also be more for the detection of nuclides of directly impacts the source location specialized for the intended interest is important. Source effectiveness of ATM. The 12- or mission and incorporate a more timing and source discrimination 24-hour sampling periods of the holistic view of that mission. are typically obtained from ratios systems deployed in the network may The overall task is to detect and of concentrations measured in not in fact represent the optimum

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 balance between detection sensitivity radioxenon measurement systems and time resolution from the point of deployed by the IMS, even though view of source location. the systems themselves exceed the initial sensitivity specifications. The How to augment operation of national monitoring network density stations contributing data to the CTBTO’s International Data Centre The most favourable case for using (IDC) in Vienna and National Data ATM to estimate a well-defined Centres should be encouraged as a source region is when several way to augment network density. network stations at different locations detect radionuclides from In the context of the Fukushima the same source event. However, releases, it is important to remember there is no guarantee that this that the IMS radionuclide network will be possible if the releases are is not designed as a radiological from a nuclear explosion with a emergency system. However, unlike yield in the kiloton range. This national networks, the IMS network is due to the current density of is a globally integrated radionuclide

ARIX noble gas system Biographical notes

FACT BOX

Caesium-137 (C s -137): Cs-137 has a half-life of 30.1 years. This is the most common radioactive form of caesium and is produced by nuclear fission. Cs-137 is one of the major radionuclides in spent nuclear fuel and radioactive wastes associated with the operation of nuclear reactors and fuel reprocessing plants. Large amounts of Cs-137 and other radioactive isotopes were released into the environment by atmospheric nuclear weapon tests between 1945 and 1980. Cs-137 did not occur in nature before nuclear weapon testing began.

IODINE-131 (I-131): I-131 has a half-life of 8.0 days. I-131 is a radioactive isotope released into the environment mostly in gaseous form as a result of the atmospheric testing of nuclear weapons and accidents that have occurred at nuclear power plants (e.g. the Anders Axelsson Anders Ringbom Chernobyl nuclear power plant in 1986 is a Senior Scientist at the Swedish is the Deputy Research Director at the and the Fukushima power plant in March Defence Research Agency, Swedish Defence Research Agency, 2011). It was a significant contributor to Division of Defence & Security Division of Defence & Security Systems the effects on human health from Systems and Technology. He is and Technology. He is a technical advisor atmospheric nuclear weapon testing and from the Chernobyl disaster. manager of the Swedish National Data to the Swedish Government and Swedish Centre for Comprehensive Nuclear- representative at the CTBTO’s Working Test-Ban Treaty monitoring. Dr Group on verification issues. Dr Ringbom XENON is a chemical element in gaseous form. It Axelsson has previously worked at the was the main developer of the noble gas is one of the noble gases which is inert Preparatory Commission for the system SAUNA and has developed and rarely reacts with other chemicals. Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban equipment and analysis techniques for Several of its radioactive isotopes, of Treaty Organization with on-site radioxenon detection used by the which one of the isotopes is xenon-133 inspection noble gas equipment and at CTBTO. In 2006 he conducted a (Xe-133), are short-lived and typical of the International Atomic Energy measurement in cooperation with South technological processes and are therefore Agency with environmental sampling Korea that detected radioxenon from the measured to detect clandestine data for international safeguards. first nuclear test in North Korea. underground nuclear explosions.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 monitoring system, the only one of its kind. The global nature of the IMS The different ‘noble gas’ systems used t o detect radionuclides in the a tmosphere network enabled the global tracking of radionuclides released in the Fukushima incident, and made the Radioactive xenon (radioxenon) isotopes data available to the governments of are produced in abundance by a nuclear all CTBTO Member States. The IMS test. Four of them are used in CTBT network clearly has some special monitoring: Xe-131m, Xe-133, Xe-133m, and qualities which make the data Xe-135. They have a half-life of between valuable. The extent to which the 9.10 hours and 11.9 days (the half-life of data can be made public is governed any given nuclide is the time required for by both practical and political one half of the sample to decay). Although constraints. On the practical side, Xe-131m has the longest half-life of these SPALAX noble gas system only data which have been properly four isotopes, its yield is the smallest. With evaluated in the context of a possible a half-life of 5.2 days, xenon-133 (Xe-133) is radiological emergency should be in most circumstances the most abundant SAUNA was developed by the Swedish released to the public. On the political of the isotopes. With suitable equipment, Defence Research Agency and made side, the operation of the IMS is a it is therefore possible to detect radioxenon commercially available in 2004. SAUNA collaborative endeavour among all isotopes days or even weeks after their samples up to 15m3 of air during a 12 Member States. It is in some ways an release and at great distances from their hour sampling interval, thus producing intrusive verification measure, with source. two samples per day. The system uses a very sensitive monitoring stations measurement technique called ‘beta-gamma located on the territory of a large The CTBTO uses three noble gas coincidence’. number of States. In order to preserve systems to detect radioxenon. Forty of long-term support for the CTBT the CTBTO’s network of 80 radionuclide ARIX was developed and commercialized verification regime and the continued stations are being equipped with one of by the Khlopin Radium Institute in the availability of data, decisions on the these special systems designed to detect Russian Federation. ARIX samples up to 15m3 handling of the monitoring data need noble gases: of ambient air and extracts xenon from it to be made with due regard for the in 12-hour cycles This system produces two different perceptions that Member • The Swedish Automatic Unit for samples per day and also uses the beta-gamma States may have of their national Noble Gas Acquisition (SAUNA) coincidence technique. interests in this respect. • Le Système de Prélèvements et d’Analyse en Ligne d’Air pour SPALAX was developed by the French A wealth of data helping quantifier le Xénon (SPALAX) Commissariat à l'énergie atomique. This to increase knowledge • The Analyzer of Xenon equipment samples up to 75m3 of air Radioisotopes (ARIX). (See below continuously in 24-hour cycles. At the The build-up of the noble gas system for more information). end of each collection cycle and after final component of the IMS has been very purification, the xenon gas is transferred into successful. New technology that many How radioxenon is isolated a High Purity Germanium detector counting doubted would work 15 years ago system. has been developed and implemented The systems work by continuously and in a short time. The new systems automatically separating xenon from The role of the analyst provide us with a vast amount of data ambient air using a purification device that results in new knowledge every that contains charcoal. Contaminants Analysts need to know which radionuclides day. The tragic Fukushima accident such as dust as well as air constituents occur naturally and which are man-made. It reminded us how important the global like oxygen, humidity, CO2 and radon is imperative to know which radionuclides are detection network can be beyond its are all removed during this process. generated by a nuclear explosion since xenon primary mission of verification. We Radioactive levels in the isolated xenon radionuclides also enter the atmosphere from now have to start gathering ideas on are then measured in a radiation counting other man-made sources. Analysts must also how to use this new knowledge in device. The resulting spectrum is sent be familiar with the quantities and ratios in a broader context in order to fulfill to the International Data Centre (IDC) which these nuclides are produced during a the CTBT verification mission to the in Vienna on a daily basis for analysis. nuclear explosion. Based on the analysis by maximum extent possible, and to The noble gas systems that are currently National Data Centres and the IDC, Member further investigate the possibilities deployed were developed in the late States can then determine whether or not the that exist for using the system for 1990s and have been tested under the sample suggests that a nuclear explosion has other purposes as well. International Noble Gas Experiment. indeed taken place.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 VERIFICATION SCIENCE with Margaret Campbell-Brown INTERVIEW Associate Professor, The University of Western Ontario The Chelyabinsk meteor: Massive blast detected by 17 infrasound stations

The CTBTO's infrasound station IS18 in Qaanaaq, Greenland, one of the stations that detected the Chelyabinsk meteorite on 15 February 2013. Photo courtesy of Owen Kilgour.

»Statistically, something this size of the meteoroid, the Sudanese desert), but that is the its mass could be only time an object has been observed hits the Earth approximately calculated directly in space and subsequently collided once every 50 years (though from the energy. with the Earth. A detection just before There was tremendous impact was not possible for this object, nothing this size or larger has been interest in the size of because it approached the Earth from observed to hit the Earth since the object, but the the direction of the sun, and was video records are very obscured by the sun’s glare. 1908). This event was nearly ten difficult to calibrate, times as energetic as the Sulawesi, so infrasound was the How often would you expect an event of Indonesia fireball of 2009.« first publicly available, this magnitude to occur and how large accurate size estimate. was it in comparison with the bolide that exploded over Sulawesi, Indonesia, in Why did the meteor go October 2009, which was recorded by 15 On 15 February 2013 at 03:22 GMT, 17 of undetected until it hit the atmosphere? of the CTBTO’s infrasound stations? the CTBTO’s infrasound stations detected signals from an object that entered the Very few objects in this size range Statistically, something this size hits atmosphere and disintegrated in the skies are currently tracked. There are likely the Earth approximately once every over Chelyabinsk, Russia. The furthest hundreds of thousands of objects 50 years (though nothing this size or station to record the sub-audible sound this size in orbits which intersect the larger has been observed to hit the was 15,000km away in Antarctica. How Earth’s, but they are faint objects, and Earth since 1908). This event was did data from these infrasound stations currently operating surveys cannot nearly ten times as energetic as the allow scientists to refine their estimates track a meaningful number of them Sulawesi, Indonesia fireball of 2009. for the size of the meteor? (though some planned surveys may allow many of them to be discovered Just days earlier on 12 February 2013, A great advantage of infrasound and monitored). An object smaller the Democratic People’s Republic of is that data are quickly available than this one was observed for about Korea (DPRK) claimed that it had and energy estimates can be made a day before it struck the Earth in conducted a nuclear test. A total of 94 of relatively quickly. Given the speed 2008 (object TC3 2008, which fell in the CTBTO’s seismic sensors registered

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013 A visual representation of the infrasound waves and parameters by the CTBTO’s International Data Centre, from the fireball recorded by the CTBTO station in Kazakhstan.

the event, which measured 4.9 in as contributing to climate change on the size of the impactor. With more magnitude. In addition, two infrasound research. What more do you think refined models of the atmospheric stations that are part of the network also scientists can learn about the Russian conditions at the time, the various detected signals. This was the first time meteor explosion on 15 February 2013 parts of the signal may be associated that the CTBTO’s infrasound stations had from CTBTO infrasound data? with fragmentation events and points registered a nuclear test. How large along the trail, giving a better idea of would you estimate the size of the The infrasound data provided what was happening to the object as it explosion over Chelyabinsk to have been excellent near-real-time information disintegrated in the atmosphere. in comparison with the nuclear test that the DPRK claims to have carried out?

I don’t know the energy of the 12 February event, but the meteor was Biographical notes certainly orders of magnitude more energetic. Margaret Campbell-Brown is an Associate Professor in the Since the Comprehensive Nuclear- Department of Physics and Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) opened for Astronomy at the University of signature in 1996, infrasound Western Ontario, Canada. Her research focuses on small bodies in technology has experienced a the solar system, particularly renaissance. While the primary purpose meteoroids. Current research topics of CTBTO infrasound monitoring is to include the interaction of meteoroids monitor compliance with the CTBT, the with the Earth's atmosphere for large data also offer a range of potential civil and small impactors, characterizing the sporadic meteoroid environment, and scientific applications. In addition to and high resolution studies of providing information on meteors meteoroid ablation to determine the entering the atmosphere, the data could composition and structure of be used to monitor aurorae, chemical meteoroids. explosions, volcanic ash clouds as well

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | July 2013 Art and Nuclear Testing

Featuring Elin O'Hara Slavick

“As a university professor, I can attest to have a sense of the unimaginable to the power of art to educate. If we can scope of our violence against civilians, interject a discussion of peacemaking and even against ourselves, especially the an understanding of our involvement in lingering perils of nuclear weapons. I use war after war into the deafening noise a ground of abstract swirling or bleeding of patriotism and the chaotic speed of to depict the manner in which bombs do information and communication systems, not stay within their intended borders. then we have begun to challenge the Radioactive materials and chemical status quo. agents contaminate the soil, travelling in water and currents of air for decades. Art can teach us in so many ways Mines and unexploded bombs lay in wait NUCLEAR about so many things: it can literally help for unsuspecting victims who were not TESTING us understand space and perspective, even alive during the war. Bombs lay the relationships between objects, scale, groundwork for genocide, cancer, more colour, composition, texture and all those war, terrorism, widows, orphans and a formal qualities; but it can also open our vengeful populace on all sides of conflict.” mind to new ways of seeing and thinking in this world – that history is usually told Elin O’Hara Slavick from one perspective and usually by men has been a Distinguished Term and the winners; that art can and does Professor at the University of North The history of nuclear testing began change the world, as much as anything Carolina in the USA since 1994. Slavick early on the morning of 16 July 1945 at else does; that we can make beautiful teaches Conceptual and Experimental a desert test site in Alamogordo, New things amidst so much ugliness; that art Photography, Collaborative Visual Mexico, USA, when the United States exploded its first atomic bomb. is hope, a constructive, positive process, Projects, Drawing, Mixed Media and and often a collaborative one – not only Body Imaging. In the five decades between that fateful between artists but between artist and day in 1945 and the opening for signature of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban viewer. Treaty (CTBT) in 1996, over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out all over the world. In my series of bomb drawings, it COUNTRY NO. OF TESTS TIMESPAN is important to show places unknown to Enewetak Atoll United States 1,032 1945-1992 most Americans, like Enewetak Atoll in by Elin O'Hara Slavick Soviet Union 715 1949-1990 the Marshall Islands, alongside infamous United Kingdom 45 1952-1991 sites like Iwo Jima where a major battle The Enewetak Atoll drawing takes as its France 210 1960-1996 reference a map from a world atlas. The United China 45 1964-1996 took place during the Second World War. States conducted forty-three atmospheric tests It is imperative that I not only represent at the Enewetak Atoll in the Marshall Islands between 1948 and 1958. Several of these tests The figures above are approximate and based on official government sources, as well as on information provided by the places familiar to everyone but were thermonuclear. The small islet of Elugelab research institutions such as the Natural Resources Defence was vapourized and the radioactive fallout Council in Washington D.C., and the Stockholm International include the lesser known locations so that Peace Research Institute (SIPRI). produced by the tests contaminated the islands people can make connections and begin and the lagoon of the atoll.

CTBTO SPECTRUM 20 | JUly 2013

The Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) bans all nuclear explosions.