Transcript Copy: Media Briefing by Foreign Affairs Director -General Ayanda Ntsaluba and Ambassador Abdul Minty on the Candidature of Ambassador Minty for the post of Director-General of the IAEA, 12 September 2008, Union Buildings

 Comments by Deputy Minister Aziz Pahad

Welcome ladies and gentlemen. My job is to introduce the Director-General of the Department of Foreign Affairs Dr Ayanda Ntsaluba and Ambassador Minty. The Director-General will brief you on our candidate – Ambassador Minty – for the Director-General’s post of the IAEA, which has been endorsed by the African Union as the African candidate. So let me without taking a lot more time just ask the DG and Ambassador Minty to go further into this issue.

 Comments by Director-General Ntsaluba

 First of all is to indicate that our government has taken a decision to put forward the candidature of Ambassador Abdul Minty for the position of Director-General of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) whose headquarters are in Vienna. 

 The recent African Union summit held in Sharm El Sheik, Egypt in July 2008, the Heads of State and Government of the African continent endorsed the candidature of Ambassador Minty for the post of Director-General of IAEA.

But of course at that time we ourselves had indicated that we are requesting the endorsement on condition that the current Director-General would not stand.  What has subsequently happened is that on Friday 5 September the IAEA indicated that Dr Mohamed El Baradei, the current Director-General of the Agency, would not avail himself for a further term at the helm of the Agency.

It is in that context that we now are putting forward the candidature of Ambassador Minty.  Most of you who are here would know that Ambassador Minty has been in the Department of Foreign Affairs for some time now.  But more importantly you would also know that he has a history that predates that and that he has been active in the area of disarmament over many decades.

And consequently it is the firm belief of the South African Government that Ambassador Minty has the requisite background and experience to continue to promote the work of the Agency and to represent South Africa well. 

The role of the Agency particularly in promoting the peaceful uses of nuclear energy and ensuring that safe and secure nuclear applications and activities will not be used to further any military purpose. Ambassador Minty’s knowledge and expertise in dealing with issues related to nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation for most of his career, make him in our view and in the view of many people across the globe best qualified to guide the IAEA towards finding creative solutions to deal with new questions and challenges arising from the dynamic environment in which the Agency is operating.

Before we get to details about some of the work that Ambassador Minty has been involved in, let me just say that we believe that the leadership of the Agency requires both a detailed knowledge but also that this is essentially a global leadership role.  South Africa would not have put forth the candidature of Ambassador Minty if we were not sure that he would perform that task.  And certainly for us, the Foreign Ministry we would attest to his managerial capabilities, his outstanding interpersonal skills and therefore we believe that he would create an environment in the Agency and among the member states that would allow for a more cooperative spirit and therefore assist in dealing with these complex issues the global environment currently faces.

Ambassador Minty’s commitment to implementing the mandate of the Agency to accelerate and enlarge the contribution of atomic peace, health and prosperity throughout the world began in the 1960s. Since then Ambassador Minty has gained extensive experience and knowledge of nuclear and arms control issues.

In April 1973, Ambassador Minty, at the age of 34, attended the First UN-OAU Conference on Southern Africa in Oslo, Norway as a member of the Steering Committee.  Four years later in August 1977, he served as a special consultant at the 2nd UN-OAU Conference, in Lagos, Nigeria, where it was proposed to launch the World Campaign against Military and Nuclear Collaboration with South Africa.

The World Campaign was established in Oslo, Norway under the patronage of President Julius Nyerere and other Front Line Heads of State and the sponsors included Mr Olof Palme, David Steel of the United Kingdom and Coretta Scott King, wife of the late Martin Luther King.

Even before our own democratic process succeeded Ambassador Minty gave evidence to the UN Security Council on South Africa’s apartheid policies in 1977 as well as the UNSC Arms Embargo Committee. Due to his expertise, the OAU requested him to give expert evidence to the UNSC on four occasions thereafter. His last appearance was on 25 May 1994, when the mandatory arms embargo against South Africa was lifted.

Moreover, Ambassador Minty has worked closely with the African Group the Non-Aligned Movement and other members of the IAEA over South Africa’s nuclear programme and attended annual General Conferences of the IAEA in Vienna to lobby for sanctions against the Apartheid Regime. This campaign resulted in the removal of South Africa from the designated seat for Africa on the IAEA Board of Governors and was replaced by Egypt in that position.

In 1995, when South Africa resumed its seat on the Board of Governors of the IAEA, Ambassador Minty was appointed as the Governor for South Africa, a position he still holds to date. In this capacity, he participates in quarterly meetings of the Board as well as in the General Conferences and other meetings related to the work of the Agency. In this regard, Ambassador Minty has played a major role in shaping key decisions of the Board of the Agency.  I’m stressing this point to you because that would suggest that he is very familiar with the issues that the IAEA is dealing with.

But ofcourse in South Africa we also know that he acted as an advisor to South         Africa’s delegation    at the 1995 Review Conference of the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). And in 2000 and 2005 he led the South African delegations Review Conferences of the NPT.

Since our first democratic elections in 1994, it has been a primary goal of South Africa's policy to reinforce our role to responsibly deal with issues related to defence products and advanced technologies in the nuclear, biological, chemical and missile fields. In so doing, we also promote the benefits which disarmament, non-proliferation and arms control hold for international peace and security for all. One of the main statutory bodies established to give effect to this policy is the South African Council for the Non-Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction. Since June 1995 Ambassador Minty served as the distinguished Chairperson of this Council, a position he still holds today.

Ambassador Minty played a significant role in South Africa’s multilateral foreign policy development as well as the transformation of the Department of Foreign Affairs after the first democratic elections in 1994. He headed the Multilateral Branch from 1995 where he oversaw South Africa’s new membership of the NAM, the Commonwealth and other bodies. Furthermore, he acted as Director-General on numerous occasions, including an extended period of over a year.

In addition, Ambassador Minty has been a member of the UN Secretary-General’s Advisory Board on Disarmament Matters for the period 2001 to 2002.

He was also elected President of the 50th Session of the IAEA General Conference on behalf of Africa in 2006.

Ambassador Minty has successfully served as the Chairperson of the Nuclear Suppliers Group (NSG) from April 2007 to May 2008 and currently serves as a member of the Troika of the Group until May 2009.

Ambassador Minty is currently the Deputy Director-General in the Department of Foreign Affairs with special responsibilities for Disarmament. He is also the Personal Representative of the President on the NEPAD Steering Committee.

Ambassador Minty holds a BSc (Economics) in International Relations and MSc (Economics) in International Relations from the University College of London. He was a Research Fellow at Richardson Institute for Conflict and Peace Research in London from 1969 to 1975 and a Senior Research Fellow at the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo from 1994 to 1995. He has published a large number of specialised articles and booklets.

The nomination of Ambassador Minty for the position of Director-General of the IAEA is the first of its kind since the end of minority rule and the dawn of a democratic dispensation in South Africa.  The South African Government believes that Ambassador Minty will serve this organisation well given his long standing commitment and involvement in this area. The IAEA will no doubt benefit from his experience and international exposure both as a seasoned diplomat and an expert on nuclear related issues.

Developing countries have largely benefited from the Agency’s assistance and co-operation through which it provided material, services, equipment, and facilities to Member States in their efforts to meet the needs of research, development and practical application of atomic energy for peaceful purposes, which facilitates their accelerated economic progress and their achievement of the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

At the same time, South Africa recognises that this potential contribution of atomic energy should not be used “in such a way to further any military purpose”, and in this regard, the Agency’s safeguards system is essential to verify that civil nuclear programmes remain peaceful, and this system needs to be strengthened.

You will no doubt agree that the next Director-General would need to be able to deal with these demands especially with regard to the diversification of energy supply from both the developed and developing world perspective.

 We really believe that it is very important especially at this particular juncture, that the work of the IAEA should be strengthened. We believe that in particular we need to have it guided in a manner that it allows countries and humanity in general to exploit the power of the Atom for peaceful process to enable the potential that lies therein can be used to advance development. 

We, given our history and most of you are familiar with our own position on issues of non-proliferation and disarmament, that we do not believe that these possibilities should be used essentially to militarise. Therefore we are strongly in our positions, which I think are shared by the greater part of humanity that we should try to aim for a world where Atoms are used for the pursuance and pursuit of peace.

Therefore because we attach so much importance, that is why it was important for South Africa to avail the services of Ambassador Minty for what we consider to be a very important task. 

It is the first time that South Africa is going to engage such a senior position through this process that we followed that the government of South Africa deliberately chooses a candidate when a position like this is available and avails that candidate to the international community. But we do that not because we simply are interested in having a South African in an important position but because of the sincere belief that we have that Ambassador Minty has the prerequisite, expertise, knowledge and enjoys the respect that we believe is necessary at this particular time so that this very delicate work of the agency can be deepened and also used much to the satisfaction of both peoples in the developed and the developing world.

The South African government, in advancing Ambassador Minty’s name, has no hesitation whatsoever that he would be equal to the task. This morning we had the opportunity to formally inform the members of the Diplomatic Corps accredited to South Africa about this candidature and requested them to make sure that their capitals are equally informed.

We will obviously doing what is necessary to support Ambassador Minty’s candidature up to and including the fact that he will have to obviously, as this is the normal practice for this sort of things, visit quiet a number of capitals so that people could have the opportunity to pose the questions that they may wish to pose to be sure that he has the necessary credentials. So we will throw him to the world fully confident that we are sure that they will at the end conclude that he would indeed be ready to perform this very important task.

Comments by Ambassador Minty

Thank you Deputy Minister and Director-General for the introduction. As you can imagine it is a great honour and privilege to be nominated by South Africa and also to be endorsed by the African Heads of State and Government. 

I think the Agency will have to continue to face many of the challenges that it has at the moment and in this new era that everyone is now describing as the era of the nuclear renaissance, which is really to convey the fact that many countries are now beginning to develop plans to rely on nuclear power, nuclear power plants, nuclear energy for their own electricity.

In the context of those developments there will be many additional responsibilities for the Agency relating to nuclear fuel cycle; of nuclear safety; of nuclear security and of verification. As you know the Agency is the only internationally recognised body for nuclear verification and has the total authority to verify the nuclear facilities in member countries and others. 

Then there is the other area that the Agency does which is not that well-known – the so-called technical cooperation where it has within its structure, the responsibility to promote the Atom for peaceful processes and thereby also help developing countries. Here it plays an important role in the area of health and to try and overcome poverty, but also in a whole lot of radiation techniques where, for example, in East Africa we got rid of the Tsetse fly which used to kill many cattle and now in KwaZulu-Natal we also have a similar project. The Agency is also working on trying to use radiation techniques to get rid of the malaria because by radiation they deal with the mosquitoes and reproduce them in a manner in which they no longer infect people. There is also a medical Doctor in Cape Town working with this international project – it is going to need many millions of Dollars before that can be completed. Of course if that succeeds you can imagine the impact it is going to make, particularly for Africa where many people still die of malaria. It does a great deal of work also in cancer and a whole lot other health issues. More information can be found on the website of the IAEA. 

We believe that our role before and now in this particular context would mean that we will be combining the developed world and the developing world’s perspective of these global issues. I say this because South Africa has a vast depository and current knowledge of nuclear matters. We have our nuclear plant in Cape Town – the Koeberg and other facilities – we do research at Phelindaba and we also produce medical isotopes. We have a past experience of the nuclear area, so we are at the forefront, if you wish, of the technology and there we can talk with expertise and experience with developed countries that have similar technology. At the same time we are part of the developing world and so the combination of this means we will try to bring together the perspectives of the developing countries and the developed world’s perspectives to try and produce and have a possible global consensus on the kind of issues that we face. 

The other issue is particularly regarding the nuclear power challenge. Many countries will be going into the nuclear arena. They will have to bid for power plants; they will have to develop their own capacity to assess those power plants, and so it is very important for us to see the transfer of technology so that the world does not just remain the world of the developed and the underdeveloped or developing. And this will be particularly important in this era so that countries that also embark on nuclear energy programmes will have the necessary skills to be able to make assessments and also to have personnel that will develop their own programmes of nuclear safety and security because that obviously will be a very important issue. As you know in a whole lot of global fora there are many discussions and debates also with the new challenges that we face of terrorism and so on, to make sure that nuclear facilities and material are safe; that it does not get in the wrong hands and that it is sufficiently protected. And of course everyone once to make sure that if you have nuclear power use for energy, that you do have the a developed culture and experience of safety and security in all those countries. 

Questions and Answers: 

Question:     When will the new Director-General of the IAEA be appointed and what is the process?

Answer:        The formal process is that the new Board of Governors will be confirmed, some elected, at the General Conference of the IAEA which will be at the end of September this year. In the first week of October the new Board of Governors will meet and the Chairman of the Board of Governors will then circulate a document which will outline the procedures. The procedure is that countries will be formally invited to submit candidatures and that process will be terminated at the end of December this year.

Then from January to June the Chairman can use a number of methods, or a number of methods together, to determine which candidates has the largest support.

The Chair has in the past consulted with members of the Board – 35 including South Africa – and through that consultation if they find that some candidates have the support of five or six members, they may request them to withdraw – some may withdraw and some may remain in the race. In the end the procedure is that if they have to take a vote then you need two thirds support for any one candidate for the Chair – a lady this time – to feel she can then put it forward as the decision of the Board of Governors. 

That then goes formally to the General Conference next year in September and the conference endorses it. It has never happened that the General conference takes a decision different from the Board so far. 

The Board also meets in March next year and should they make remarkable progress and decides on the candidate in March then it would be clear from March that the Board will make a recommendation. But often because of the high level political and other interaction that takes place the Board usually makes the decision by June when it meets. That is the last meeting of the Board before the General Conference where it has to submit all the documentation. So the decision will be made by the Board no later than June and that decision needs to be confirmed by the General Conference in September. 

The current Director-General then completes his term at the end of November in 2009 so the newly-elected Director-General will have to take over the Agency’s helm by the first of December 2009 – it is a four-year term. 

Question:     Can you tell us of other candidates and also whether there is any sort of rotation system for the post of the Director-General? 

Answer:        The other candidate at the moment is Ambassador Yukiya Amano – Japan’s resident representative to the IAEA in Vienna and he is also Japan’s governor on the IAEA Board of Governors. So he is the only, if you wish, declared candidate so far. He has been lobbying for some months since last year. For the moment it will be the Japanese candidate and I. 

The Agency has no procedure or historical precedence with regard to rotation. The approach has been that they must seek the best candidate and there has not so far been any issue with regard to the geographical origins of the candidates. 

Question:     The current Chair has also been mentioned as possibly being put forward as a candidate 

Answer:        Well there is a lot of speculation about people who may be candidates but in a way until they declare you do not know who they are. He has not indicated to any of us on the Board that he is a candidate. 

Question:     (Directed at Deputy Minister Pahad) Deputy Minister on the issue of Zimbabwe I just want to get a comment from you. Is there any fear that even though this agreement has been reached, one of the parties may pull out?

Answer:        Let me first of all say I think it is it is commonly now known that all parties, after months of discussion and in the last four days, under the facilitation of President Mbeki, have signed on and without reservations.

Now this agreement is due to be formally and officially signed on Monday where they will give us details of the agreement and where other Heads of State and Government of SADC and other international dignitaries will be present. 

We have no indication that after the decisions last night anything has happened to get any one party to pull out. I think it is an important historic decision. I think it opens up the possibilities of what we have always been saying – that if Africa and the international community create the conditions, ultimately it is only the Zimbabwean people that can come to a solution which we will then have to support.

And now the task is – having got this historic political agreement – South Africa and SADC and indeed the whole international community must work together to work on reconstruction and development and reconciliation in Zimbabwe.

So it is a very important new challenge now, a healthier challenge. My own view is I do not think anybody is going to pull out at this stage. I hope this historic agreement has put to sleep the fallacious notion of quiet diplomacy because it was always our view that diplomacy by its own nature is quiet. 

It is clear that the way the facilitation team under President Mbeki has worked has finally gotten us to a stage where we can say all of Southern Africa, all of Africa, I think the international community - the (UN) Secretary General has already pronounced on this, is indicating that we are now on the right road to finding a long term solution to the Zimbabwean problems. Now it is the economic challenge that while we consolidate the political solution that we are going to have to concentrate on. 

Question:     In terms of the reconstruction and development what are we going to be doing as a country to assist? Besides President Mbeki who else from government will be in Zimbabwe for the signing? 

Answer:        Obviously the facilitation team led by President Mbeki will be there and Foreign Affairs will be there. It is a matter that the President will determine if he wants other ministers to be there. Minister Mufamadi led the facilitation team, supported by Reverent Chikane and Advocate Gumbi – so they will be there.

As you recall, the Extraordinary SADC Summit held in Tanzania took two decisions. Firstly they mandated President Mbeki to facilitate on the political issue and it mandated the Executive Secretary to begin the process of understanding how SADC could assist Zimbabwe to deal with its economic crisis. The World Bank has already been working on programmes post political solution; the USA government has already committed billions in terms of the post political settlement commitments to this process. I believe the EU has committed that once there is a political settlement they will also come in, in terms of the international united approach to deal with the situation in Zimbabwe.

I think private capital in South Africa and elsewhere have for a long time indicated that they see Zimbabwe as a tremendous potential for economic activity and that they do not feel that it would be too difficult to turn the Zimbabwean economic crisis around if everybody worked together. I believe that is what we will see once the political agreement is consolidated. I think we will see government, non-government including the private sector moving in quiet decisively to help turn around the Zimbabwean economic situation.

Issued by Department of Foreign Affairs
Private Bag X152
Pretoria
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12 September 2008