By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 3:45 a.m. ET
UNITED NATIONS (AP) -- The failure of a global nuclear conference leaves it to President Bush and other world leaders to ''think outside the box'' at a September summit and find new ways to stem the spread of nuclear arms, U.N. officials say.
After a month of sharp debate, the conference ended Friday with a whimper: no consensus recommendations for strengthening the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty, the pact that has helped keep the lid on doomsday arms since 1970.
The failure comes at a time of mounting nuclear tensions around the world.
North Korea has pulled out of the treaty and says it is building atom bombs. Iran's nuclear fuel program raises questions about possible weapons plans. Arab states view Israel's nuclear arsenal as increasingly provocative. The conference had futilely debated proposals to address all these issues.
Many delegates also were disturbed over Bush administration talk of modernizing the U.S. nuclear force, and sought U.S. reaffirmation of commitments made to disarmament steps at the nonproliferation conferences of 1995 and 2000.
As the meeting drew toward a close, however, the U.S.-led Western group of nations blocked any mention of those past commitments in the conference's thin final report.
Delegates said they feared that the outcome -- the most complete failure at such nonproliferation conferences in 35 years -- might undermine faith in the treaty, a cornerstone of global arms control.
U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan agreed, believing the ''inability to strengthen their collective efforts is bound to weaken the treaty,'' his spokesman said. Annan said world leaders should deal with the issues at a global summit scheduled here for September.
Mohamed ElBaradei, the U.N. nuclear agency chief, called the summit ''a golden opportunity.''
''These are fundamental issues that ought to be addressed at the highest policy level because they need an unconventional way of thinking, thinking outside the box,'' he said in an interview from his International Atomic Energy Agency headquarters in Vienna.
One question needing ''urgent attention'' involves the nuclear fuel cycle, he said. Iran's uranium-enrichment technology can produce both fuel for peaceful nuclear energy and material for bombs -- and Washington contends weapons are what Tehran has in mind.
ElBaradei has proposed a five-year moratorium on establishment of any new fuel-cycle facilities worldwide while plans are developed for better controls, possibly even international control of nuclear fuel production. It's a politically explosive matter, however, since it involves commercial and government nuclear programs of sovereign states.
The failed conference was the latest of the twice-a-decade gatherings of the members of the 188-nation nonproliferation treaty, called to assess the treaty's workings and find ways to improve them.
Under the nuclear pact, states without atomic arms pledged not to develop them, and five with the weapons -- the United States, Russia, Britain, France and China -- undertook to eventually eliminate their arsenals. The nonweapons states, meanwhile, were guaranteed access to peaceful nuclear technology.
Delegations here had proposed ideas, for example, for limiting access to dual-use technology with bombmaking potential, along with proposals to strengthen inspection of nuclear facilities and to pressure nuclear-armed states to shrink their arsenals more quickly.
On treaty withdrawal, which North Korea managed without consequence under the nonproliferation pact, some delegations supported plans to make the process more difficult and penalty-laden.
But the dozens of proposals were stalled for more than two weeks while delegations squabbled over the agenda. Then, when debate finally started, it proved impossible to win consensus in committees.
Iran objected to any mention of it as a proliferation concern. Egypt balked at toughening treaty withdrawal, since it wants that option open as long as ex-enemy Israel has nuclear bombs. And the United States fought every reference to its 1995 and 2000 commitments.
Those commitments included, for example, activating the nuclear test-ban treaty and negotiating a verifiable treaty to ban production of bomb materials -- both steps the Bush administration opposes, but other weapons states support.
