國立臺灣大學政治科學論叢

Abstract / Chinese PDF Download

Iran has been advocating the peaceful use of nuclear energy allowing for the development and possession uranium enrichment technology, which is a core element for nuclear fuel manufacturing, while claiming that it is the right of a sovereign state to ensure its secure supply of nuclear fuel. However, as uranium enrichment is a key technology for the development of nuclear weapons, the U. S. and European countries are concerned that once such development has been granted to Iran, there is a potential risk for the proliferation of nuclear weapons. After the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) came into force, international law-making processes for the assurance of nuclear fuel supplyhad accidently constructed the normative hierarchy of the NPT principles.

By recalling the regime reconstruction process of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT), law-making for the nuclear fuel supply assurance during the JCPOA negotiations, as well as the agenda-setting initiated by Trump administration’s attempt to comprehensively re-deprive Iran’s nuclear capability, this article discovers that the great powers that manipulated the NPT regime could input new ideas. These ideas include the assurance of nuclear fuel supply through the interaction of powers during international negotiations, which add new preconditions for the implementationof the principle of the peaceful use of nuclear energy and constrain the rights under which non-nuclear states of the NPT regime can peacefully use nuclear energy. The hegemony can unilaterally veto the normative arrangement that are against its interests and create extra space for the normative reconstruction of international regimes.