UNITED NATIONS, May 10 (Xinhua) -- A United Nations official said Friday that there is a large convergence on the peaceful use of nuclear energy among states parties to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), but not on nuclear disarmament.
"There are a lot of convergence on that (peaceful use of nuclear energy)," Syed Hasrin Syed Hussin, chair of the Third Preparatory Committee for the 2020 NPT Review Conference, told a press conference.
However, he said that "we can see that the views are still quite wide apart on how to move forward with regard to the implementation of Article 6, dealing with nuclear disarmament."
Hussin told reporters at the UN headquarters in New York that the world is going through "a time of increasing international tension and deteriorating relationship between those countries that possess nuclear weapons."
He said that the NPT states parties attending the Third Preparatory Committee for the 2020 NPT Review Conference "do not agree on everything, but they have remained resolute in their commitment to the full implementation" of the treaty across all three of its pillars (non-proliferation, disarmament, and peaceful use of nuclear energy).
"They have engaged in open dialogue on how to accelerate progress towards a world free of nuclear weapons, including through measures to prevent their proliferation," he added.
Since 1995, NPT review conferences have produced decisions, action plans, practical steps and measures to improve the effectiveness of the review process itself.
The NPT, signed in 1968 and effective since 1970, is the only treaty that contains legally-binding commitments to pursuing nuclear disarmament. A total of 191 states have joined the treaty.