Mick Wallace (Wexford, Independent)
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113. To ask the Minister for Foreign Affairs and Trade if he is satisfied that Ireland is taking every action at its disposal to further the cause of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [28403/15]

Charles Flanagan (Laois-Offaly, Fine Gael)
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Ireland's long track record in the area of nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation dates back to the late 1950s when Ireland's efforts at the United Nations General Assembly led to the negotiation of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT). I addressed the NPT Review Conference in New York at its opening on 27 April this year in order to highlight Ireland's continuing strong commitment to nuclear disarmament. I also had the opportunity to meet with a number of delegations on that occasion.

It is a matter of great regret that, despite strenuous efforts, including by Ireland, the 2015 NPT Review Conference ended without an agreed outcome document. Both before and during the Conference, Ireland worked for concrete progress on creating an effective outcome document through our national efforts and also through the New Agenda Coalition (NAC), a cross-regional group of States, including Ireland, which are committed to promoting urgent progress on nuclear disarmament.

Right from the inception of the NPT, Ireland has emphasised - primarily for humanitarian reasons - the urgent need to pursue the effective measures for nuclear disarmament mandated by Article VI of the Treaty. It is clear that, in order to be effective, these measures need to be legally binding, and it is my view that work on elaborating them needs to begin immediately.

The need for urgent progress on nuclear disarmament has been given even greater impetus by the facts and research presented at three major recent conferences on the risks and consequences associated with nuclear weapons and the devastating humanitarian consequences of any nuclear detonation whether by accident or design. A statement endorsed at the Review Conference by 159 States, including Ireland, asserts that nuclear weapons must never be used again under any circumstances and that the only way of ensuring this is through their total elimination.

Ireland's final statement to the Review Conference recalled our commitment to nuclear disarmament and our belief that effective measures for the implementation of Article VI are required as a matter of urgency.

This has always been and remains Ireland's position, as was shown last year when Ireland was Coordinator of the New Agenda Coalition and contributed significantly to the debate at the Final Preparatory Committee meeting for the NPT Review Conference by presenting on behalf of the NAC a Working Paper with detailed proposals on the effective measures required by Article VI. This work was taken forward by the current NAC Coordinator, New Zealand, at the Review Conference itself. I can assure the Deputy that we will continue to work towards achieving a world without nuclear weapons, including by consulting closely with like-minded partners and by supporting South Africa, which assumed the role of Coordinator of the New Agenda Coalition on the 1 July 2015.