Indonesian minister to attend nuclear treaty talks in New York

Jakarta (ANTARA News) – Foreign Minister Marty Natalegawa will lead an Indonesian delegation to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) Review Session to be held at the UN Headquarters in New York on May 3 to 28, 2010.

The Indonesian delegation will be composed of representatives from the foreign ministry, the Indonesian permanent representative mission in New York, Indonesian permanent representative office in Vienna and from several technical government agencies. According to the ministry of foreign affairs, the session which constituted the eighth of its kind since the establishment of the NPT, will evaluate the implementation of a number of regulations laid down in the treaty.

The NPT is basically built on three pillars, namely nuclear arms reduction, non-proliferation and nuclear energy development for peaceful purposes. It is expected that the foreign minister would make an Indonesian statement on Monday local time.

He will also make a statement on behalf of the Non-Aligned Movement State Parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Indonesia is the coordinator of the Working Group of the 118-member Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) on Arms Reduction. Based the results of the preparatory meetings held in the 2007-2009 period, it was expected that all NPT member states will have comprehensive deliberations on such issues as arms reduction, additional protocols, security, the Middle East situation and membership withdrawals.(*)