GIFF JOHNSON
The Marshall Islands signed the Treaty of Rarotonga at Monday’s Nuclear Remembrance Day nearly 40 years since the nuclear free zone agreement was initiated.
“It was important for us to sign the treaty,” said Acting Foreign Minister and Finance Minister David Paul, who signed the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty Monday with survivors of the 1954 Bravo hydrogen bomb test, President Hilda Heine and Pacific Islands Forum Secretary General Baron Waqa watching.
The RMI is the first of the three freely associated states in the North Pacific to sign the treaty.
The treaty was first signed by nine Pacific Island Forum members, including Australia and New Zealand, in Rarotonga on September 6, 1985 — hence the treaty’s name. Other island nations followed, with the most recent signatory being Tonga in 1996. All 13 that signed the treaty between 1985 and 1996 have also formally ratified the treaty through their constitutional processes.
“A significant part of the (Nuclear Remembrance Day) ceremony was President Heine’s announcement of the RMI’s signing off on the South Pacific Nuclear Free Zone Treaty, which marks a historic step in strengthening the country’s commitment to a nuclear-free Pacific,” said a President’s Office release. The treaty, which establishes a nuclear weapons-free zone in the South Pacific, “further strengthens the Marshall Islands’ commitment to promoting peace and security in the region and advancing global disarmament efforts,” the statement said.
Minister Paul explained that the Marshall Islands consulted with the United States government prior to signing the agreement to ensure it would not affect US defense obligations under the Compact. The US raised no issues for the RMI to sign the treaty, he said.
The discussions with the US led to agreement that prior to the government taking the next step of introducing the treaty to Nitijela for ratification, the RMI and US would negotiate a memorandum of understanding that spells out US obligations under the Compact to avoid conflicts with the treaty, Paul said.
The Compact as a defense and security agreement allows the US to test missiles at Kwajalein, and for military vessels to come to port. One of the three significant features of the Treaty of Rarotonga is that it forbids the manufacture, stationing or testing of nuclear weaponry within the zone.