The 10 members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) would draft Saturday afternoon a plan of action to ensure a treaty banning nuclear weapons in the region with full cooperation from the world's nuclear powers, Foreign Affairs Secretary Alberto Romulo said.
Romulo said the ASEAN wants a common regional strategy to convince the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council to endorse the proposed Southeast Asian Nuclear Weapons Free Zone (SEANWFZ) Treaty.
This will ensure that no nuclear weapons pass through the region at anytime and use of nuclear energy for power will follow international safety standards, Romulo told a press conference. Romulo also said the SEANWFZ Executive Committee, which he also chairs, wants full regional compliance with the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
"Our desire is that (UN Security Council) Permanent five countries should agree to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty which would make Southeast Asia a nuclear free zone," he said.
ASEAN member-states also want all nations in the region to implement International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) safeguards in the use of nuclear power and in the handling of nuclear weapons.
"The IAEA has a set of procedures or safeguards so we want them to be available and make use of it. We will then have to seek support of all countries particularly those with nuclear power," he explained.
The SEANWFZ was ratified by ASEAN members in 1997 and this year's meeting of the Executive Committee is first to review implementation of the treaty.
"So many other countries are developing nuclear power. They're supposed to be clean energy. All these will come into the discussion on the SEANWFZ," he said.
