Key points
- MTCR’s membership has grown to 35 countries.
- Updates reflect a renewed US commitment to non-proliferation
ISLAMABAD: United States (US) President Joe Biden, on January 3, issued a national security memorandum to update policy guidance for the US government’s implementation of the Missile Technology Control Regime “MTCR”.
According to a post of January 7, 2025, on White House website, these updates reflect a renewed US commitment to non-proliferation, while advancing the president’s goals of strengthening allied defence capabilities, bolstering the US defence industrial base, streamlining defence trade, and deterring adversaries.
These policy changes will help the United States advance shared defence objectives with close allies, including the implementation of AUKUS, while maintaining a strong leadership role on non-proliferation and export control policy, it said.
MTCR’s membership
Since MTCR’s formation by the G7 nearly four decades ago, its membership has grown to 35 countries. The MTCR was developed to reduce the threat of nuclear weapons proliferation by limiting exports of missile delivery systems; in 1992, the MTCR expanded to focus on the proliferation of missiles for delivery of all types of weapons of mass destruction, the post said.
The NSM directs the interagency to provide increased flexibility for case-by-case review and facilitate support for certain MTCR Category I military missiles, Unmanned Aerial Systems (UAS), and Space Launch Vehicle (SLV) systems to certain partners with strong export control systems. While this support will encompass a wide range of activity, consistent with MTCR Guidelines, it will explicitly exclude transfers of complete production facilities that encompass all capabilities necessary to produce a Category I system independently, it said.
Case-by-case basis
The post on the White House websites stated, the NSM establishes that the MTCR is not designed to impede national space programmes or international cooperation in such programmes as long as such programmes could not contribute to delivery systems for WMD. In support of the US Space Priorities Framework (USSPF) and the promotion of international cooperation in space, and in accordance with the MTCR Guidelines, transfers of MTCR Category I SLV related commodities, software, and technology will be considered on a case-by-case basis for select and vetted partner space programmes and participation in international space programmes, whether such programmes are governmental or commercial in nature.
It said the NSM reaffirms the MTCR as an important mechanism and will continue to oppose missile programmes of concern, and will maintain a general policy of not supporting the development or acquisition of MTCR Category I military missile systems (i.e., not SLVs by non-MTCR partners consistent with US commitments under the MTCR Guidelines. The United States will also work to stem the flow of advanced dual-use technology or expertise to unauthorized parties, i.e., end-users and end-uses that pose an unacceptable risk of diversion to programmes and activities of concern.
Additionally, the United States will use the MTCR, other multilateral non-proliferation regimes, and US non-proliferation and export control laws, regulations, and policy to continue addressing regional proliferation challenges, disrupting proliferation networks, and addressing efforts to circumvent non-proliferation controls around the world. In implementing the MTCR, the United States will work to ensure the regime keeps pace with the evolution in missile technology, and prevents the transfer of technologies that would threaten the United States, allies, partners, and other countries around the world, it said.
