ABSTRACT
The realization within the international community that a wider proliferation of nuclear weapons would pose a threat to world security has led to the development of a non-proliferation regime, encompassing myriad rules and institutions both national and international. The essential non-proliferation undertakings are contained in the first two articles of the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. The only effective way to avoid such ‘oblique proliferation’ would be for the parties to deny nuclear material and equipment to any country which is not bound by a legal commitment not to acquire nuclear weapons. To the extent that the nuclear weapon states have been among the principal sponsors of non-proliferation and at the same time the main suppliers of nuclear material, equipment and technology, they are vulnerable to the charge of having attempted to preserve a monopoly over the civilian uses of nuclear energy.
