Indonesian move a threat to nuclear submarines deal

Indonesia is lobbying a bloc of 120 developing nations to help it close a legal loophole on which Australia is relying to acquire nuclear-powered submarines.

Royal Australian Navy submarine HMAS Sheean in Hobart. Picture: Getty Images

Indonesia is lobbying a bloc of 120 mostly developing nations to help it close a legal loophole on which Australia is relying to acquire ­nuclear-powered submarines, in what it says is a “concrete effort to save lives”.

Indonesian officials have confirmed they are urging fellow Non-Aligned Movement states – a group established during the Cold War era – to support Jakarta’s position at a month-long conference in New York that will review the UN Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty.

The move represents a clear threat to efforts by Australia – backed by the US and Britain – to obtain nuclear-propulsion technology on the grounds that it would not violate the treaty.

China will also oppose Australia’s nuclear submarine ambitions at the NPT conference, which began on Monday, arguing that the transfer of nuclear-propulsion technology to a non-nuclear weapons state would set a “dangerous precedent”.

The AUKUS partners will push back at critics of the submarine plan, promising “suitable verification” that highly enriched uranium used in the submarines’ reactors will not be diverted to make nuclear weapons.

Jakarta has consistently expressed concerns over Australia’s nuclear submarine bid since the AUKUS security pact was revealed last September.

It submitted a working paper to the NPT review last week, warning that sharing nuclear-propulsion technology could have “catastrophic” consequences because of the risk that highly enriched uranium could be diverted to weapons programs.

Indonesia’s paper warned any move to share nuclear technology and materials with non-nuclear states could set a precedent for other nations, undermining efforts to prevent nuclear weapons ­proliferation.

While its written submission does not single out Australia, Indonesia’s NPT review delegation chiefs told a briefing on Sunday that countries that opposed efforts by non-nuclear weapons states Australia and Brazil to develop nuclear submarines “consider there has been a violation of nuclear non-proliferation commitments”.

They said this could encourage non-nuclear states to “flirt” with those that maintained nuclear weapons.

“It is a concrete effort to save human lives and humanity, and most importantly fill the gaps that exist in the context of the inter­national legal regime that specifically regulates this issue,” Indonesian delegation chief Tri Tharyat said. “The point is, the use of nuclear energy for submarines should be strictly regulated and monitored by the (International Atomic Energy Agency) and we continue to call for strict compliance with existing safeguards.”

Indonesia’s UN ambassador, Arrmanatha Nasir, said as chief negotiator for the non-aligned movement on the NPT, Indonesia had been engaging with fellow NAM member states leading up to the conference, and would continue to do so throughout the month-long review.

“We have discussed it with NAM countries and they are generally very supportive of Indonesia’s efforts to issue a paper on nuclear propulsion on submarines, in which the principle is in line with what we hold in NAM,” he said. He singled out Malaysia as one country that had “expressed full support”.

In a working paper lodged with the UN review in July, the AUKUS partners reaffirmed their commitment to abide by the NPT, and to establish a verification process for the atomic watchdog to ensure all nuclear material was properly accounted for.

“Partners are committed to doing this in a way that meets the highest possible non-proliferation standards including by providing complete, welded power units so that Australia need not conduct uranium enrichment nor fuel fabrication,” the working paper said.

Additional reporting: Dian Septiari