FORTY-THREE African states yesterday signed a treaty declaring Africa free of nuclear weapons at a ceremony marred by Russian reservations about the document.
The Treaty of Pelindaba, named after the birthplace of the nuclear arsenal which South Africa later dismantled, bans the possession or deployment of nuclear weapons throughout the African continent and the islands around it.
Four of the five "declared" nuclear powers Britain, China, France and the US signed separate protocols promising not to use or threaten to use nuclear weapons against African states and not to test nuclear devices in the region.
However, the Russian deputy Foreign Minister. Mr Victor Passouvaliouk, the fifth nuclear power, said his country had not yet decided whether to sign the two protocols.
"We are thoroughly examining the question of signing. Obviously we will need some time to take the appropriate decisions, bearing in mind their multifaceted and long term implications and given the ongoing existence in the region of military bases of other nuclear powers.
The African treaty already includes more states than either of its predecessors. The 1967 Treaty of Tlatelolco covers 30 states in Latin America and the Caribbean, and the 1985 Treaty of Rarotonga for the South Pacific now has 14 signatories.
President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt, a vociferous opponent of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction, said the Africans had set an example which the Middle East and the rest of the world should follow.
"I urge all the states of the Middle Fast to take a similar step between them so that we can protect this region from the dangers of these lethal weapons," he said.