Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Affairs, what discussions he has had with his counterpart in the United States on ratifying the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty.

The UK frequently calls for the entry into force of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) which requires that all Annex II States - China, DPRK (North Korea), Egypt, India, Iran, Israel, Pakistan and USA - sign and ratify the CTBT. On 27 February, I [Minister Docherty] called for the entry into force of the CTBT in a speech at the Conference on Disarmament. On 6 April, the UK and France issued a joint statement on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of joint ratification of the CTBT including our call for the universalisation of the Treaty and for all States who had not yet done so to sign and ratify the Treaty.