(introduction...)

The reporting procedure on the implementation of disarmament treaties is called “verification”. One of the main goals of verification is confidence-building between old adversaries, most notably the USA and the former USSR.

There is no general official and universally-accepted definition of verification. It includes the following components:

(1) the existence of an obligation, the fulfilment and observance of which must be verified;

(2) the gathering of information relating to fulfilment of the obligation:

(3) the analysis, interpretation and evaluation of the information from a technical, legal and political viewpoint;

(4) assessment concerning observance or non-observance of the obligation, which concludes the actual verification exercise. While the consideration of appropriate reactions to possible violation of an obligation appears to be a logical consequence of this exercise, it is not in itself an integral part of verification.³⁴

³⁴ U.N. Doc. UNIDIR/92/28, 1.