If a rogue state were to carry out a nuclear test, there is a world organisation already organised to detect it.
The preparatory commission for the Comprehensive Nuclear-test-ban treaty organisation (CTBTO) has a world-wide monitoring system to hear the blast and was even training last week at the Stupava military base in Slovakia to send in people for on-site inspections to find the exact spot of such an explosion.
And with impressive state-of-the-art technology they can do this weeks after the actual blast, tracing aftershocks over a billionth less powerful than a major earthquake.
CTBTO scientists set off dynamite charges at the military site of up to 600 grams and then were able to detect the explosions from up to five kilometres (three miles) away.
High winds were blowing, which forced the scientists to bury their instruments deep in the ground, German geophysicist Manfred Joswig told reporters, in explaining that even wind could disturb the highly sensitive can-shaped seismometers used to trace the blasts.
There was only one catch to this incredible display of applied science. The treaty has not yet been ratified and so all this training remains just that, training.
"On-site inspections can only be done when the treaty goes into force," said CTBTO chief public information official Daniela Rozgonova.
Diplomats warn the treaty may remain moribund as the United States has so far failed to ratify it and is even thinking of turning its back on nuclear testing to develop low-yield, "bunker-busting" atomic bombs.
The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty which bans any nuclear explosions for military or civilian purposes was signed in 1996 by 71 states, including the five main nuclear weapons states, and now has 173 member states.
The treaty says that the 44 nations that had nuclear research or power facilities when it was adopted in 1996 must ratify it in order for the ban to come into force.
But only 33 have done so, and three key states - India, Pakistan and North Korea - have not signed the treaty at all. Both India and Pakistan have carried out nuclear tests since 1996, while North Korea is threatening to do so.
Meanwhile, the US Congress in May lifted restrictions on research on small nuclear weapons.
But the treaty soldiers on with its Vienna-based preparatory committee overseeing an annual budget in 2004 of 94.5 million dollars (77.5 million euros), according to Rozgonova.
The treaty mandates an international monitoring system (IMS) with 321 stations, the first global network to monitor the earth for evidence of a nuclear explosion. Rozgonova said over 50 percent of the system is already up and running.
If, for instance, North Korea exploded a nuclear device, "we would detect it most likely, possibly a 98 percent guarantee. We would detect it."
But "we would not announce it publicly" since "the data belongs to our member states" who determine what the data means, Rozgonova said. In addition, since the treaty has not been ratified, "the system is still in a testing phase at this stage" and "that imposes even more restrictions."
The IMS would pick up even a relatively small nuclear blast but could only localise such an explosion to within an area of 1,000 square kilometres.
After that, on-site testing would be needed to find the exact site.
"Time is a very crucial factor. It is important for us to be there at most three, four weeks after the explosion," since after that there are no more aftershocks from the shifting of ground in underground cavities made by a nuclear blast, CTBTO staffer Patrick Dewez said.
But, noted Dewez, "there have never been any on-site verifications in the past," and nothing can happen until the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty overcomes the current stalemate to become international law.
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