25 years of Cooperation between Kazakhstan and USA Organizations in Weapon of Mass Destruction Proliferation Prevention at the STS

  On October 17, 2018 a solemn meeting was held in the National Nuclear Center in Kurchatov town,  attended by representatives of  USA Embassy in RK, as well as leaders and senior specialists from DTRA and DOE/NNSA.

          The meeting was dedicated to 25th anniversary of the event when on December 13, 1993, Parliament of Kazakhstan had ratified Non-Proliferation Treaty and the same day Kazakhstan President Nursultan Abishevich Nazarbayev and USA Vice-President Albert Gore signed an Umbrella Agreement between the Republic of Kazakhstan and USA concerning liquidation of silo-launchers for intercontinental ballistic missiles, elimination of emergency consequences and prevention of nuclear weapon proliferation. 

These two important documents opened the way to implementation of Cooperative Threat Reduction Program (Nunn-Lugar Program) in Kazakhstan and have become a start point for cooperative efforts of the Republic of Kazakhstan and USA in weapon of mass destruction proliferation prevention.

         Summarize the 25-year activity, it should be mentioned that specialists of the RK National Nuclear Center and organizations of USA Department of Defense and Department of Energy have completed unique scientific-technical and engineering operations to make STS safer. The efforts resulted in liquidation of nuclear testing infrastructure, large-scale measures were taken to reduce risks related to weapon of mass destruction and prevent access to residues of nuclear activity located at the territory of test site.

The meeting participants noticed that the effort was performed for the first time in the world, in severe conditions they had to consider important decisions, shoulder responsibility, and assistance in the decision making was - solidarity, kind and respectful relation to each other, since everyone understood their involvement in solution of one of global problems.

In consequence of the effort, the test site indeed have become safer than it was before, direct threat which the test site posed to Kazakhstan and the world community, was localized. Potential threat zone was brought to safe condition in terms of engineering and physical protection.

Summarizing the meeting, Erlan Batyrbekov, NNC RK Director General noticed: “We are sure the obtained experience, developed cooperation in such a “sensitive” area, will form the basis for future effective cooperation between organizations of USA and Kazakhstan”.