Australia and New Zealand accuse Russia of blocking nuclear deal | the world

Australia and New Zealand accused Russia of obstructing a Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) review conference that ended Friday without a deal after Moscow rejected criticism of Ukraine’s seizure of the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant.

“Russia has deliberately blocked progress. Its actions directly challenge the fundamental principles of the NPT,” Australian Foreign Minister Benny Wong said in a statement late Sunday, referring to the binding multilateral treaty that calls for nuclear disarmament.

After four weeks of negotiations in New York on the NPT, Wong lamented that “Russia was the only country opposed to agreeing to a meaningful and balanced outcome on the treaty’s three pillars: disarmament, non-proliferation and the peaceful uses of nuclear energy”.

For his part, New Zealand’s Disarmament and Arms Control Minister Phil Twyford accused Russia of “diplomatic sabotage” of the NPT, signed by 191 countries, marked by “times of uncertainty and global insecurity”. events, with a Moscow-ordered invasion of Ukraine in February of this year.

“Despite the United States’ commitment to new arms control talks, it is deeply disappointing that the nuclear-armed states have been unable to agree on anything meaningful in terms of real disarmament,” the New Zealand minister added in a statement.

The positions of Australia and New Zealand, in line with the positions of countries such as the United States, come after Russia vetoed a consensus statement criticizing the conditions at the Zaporizhia plant and calling for it to return control of the plant. Ukrainian authorities.

The Zaporizhia facilities, Europe’s largest nuclear power plant, were seized by Russian troops at the start of the war, and Moscow and Kiev have blamed each other in recent days – prompting warnings. Potentially catastrophic event.