Friday, September 12, 2014

United States Calls Revised Sino-Russian Spcae Weapons Ban "Fundamentally Flawed"

A U.S. review of an updated Chinese-Russian treaty proposal to ban weapons in space finds that it suffers from the same problems that made the original version unacceptable, an American diplomat said.

Ambassador Robert Wood, the U.S. representative to the Conference on Disarmament in Geneva, said Sept. 9 that the United States had completed an in-depth review of the revised treaty, formally known as the “Treaty on the Prevention of the Placement of Weapons in Outer Space, the Threat or Use of Force against Outer Space Objects” and generally referred to as PPWT. China and Russia had submitted an update to their original 2008 proposal in June.

“According to the U.S. analysis, the draft PPWT, like the earlier 2008 version, remains fundamentally flawed,” Wood said in his prepared remarks for a plenary session of the Conference on Disarmament.

Wood, in his speech, cited a number of issues with the PPWT, including the lack of a verification mechanism and no restrictions on the development and stockpiling of anti-satellite (ASAT) weapons on the ground. That means, he said, a nation “could develop a readily deployable space-based weapons break-out capability” should it decide to withdraw from the treaty.

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