Q: You were asked to lead the negotiations on the CTBT in 1996. How did this come about?
The CTBT was negotiated in Geneva in the Conference on Disarmament following the 1993 mandate, which preceded my arrival. For the next three years—1994, 1995 and 1996—we negotiated. I chaired these negotiations in 1996 during the so-called “end game”.
Unlike the UN’s five regional groupings, the Conference on Disarmament had a rotating chairmanship that revolved amongst three groups: the Eastern European Group, the non-aligned Group of 21 and the Western Group.
When the negotiations started in 1994, they were chaired by the Mexican Ambassador in Geneva, Miguel Marin-Bosch (G21). In 1995 the Chairmanship passed to Polish Ambassador Ludwik Dembinski (Eastern European Group). And in the decisive year of 1996, the chair was to pass to the Western Group. At that time there were 12 Western ambassadors to choose from, three of them from Nuclear Weapon States, who would not have been appropriate to appoint as Chairperson. Of the nine remaining ambassadors, I was selected to the Chairmanship for several reasons, including my relatively long multilateral experience, my previous stint in the Conference on Disarmament, my having chaired one of the two Working Groups in 1995, and my competent staff which included a number of experienced people from the Netherlands. That is how I came to assume the Chairmanship in that final and decisive year of 1996.
Q: What were your main achievements, challenges and problems?
Assuming my position as Chairman of the Ad Hoc Committee in January of 1996, it was clear from the outset that we would be working under time pressure since the UN General Assembly had already passed a resolution calling for the Treaty to be ready for signature by September at the opening of its 51st session. So perhaps the most important achievement was that, by June of that year, my team and I were able to offer a draft text for conference delegates to take home to their governments for consideration in the inter-sessional period in July.
