Abstract

In the past, all nuclear activities were strictly controlled by governments. The risk of proliferation was thus a matter of international relations, and it has been rather successfully dealt with through a system based on the NPT, and on the action of the most important countries. That picture has changed dramatically over the years. The activities discovered in Iraq in 1991, and recently in Iran and Libya, have shown the use of new techniques and of clandestine facilities almost undetectable. The required equipment had been secretly purchased from an increasing number of countries, and all operations had been managed by a clandestine international network, evading the controls and regulations of States paralysed inside their borders. Nuclear proliferation becomes a problem depending not on treaties and international institutions, but on the efficiency of intelligence agencies, police, and customs. New techniques must be found, new types of international cooperation are necessary to fight that risk.