An Additional Protocol to the nuclear safeguards agreement (AP) between the IAEA and the US entered into force on 6 January 2009.
US Ambassador Gregory Schulte formally handed over the notification of the completion of the US´ ratification procedures to IAEA Director General Mohamed ElBaradei, marking the effective date for the entry into force of the AP for the country.
With the entry into force of the US AP, all five nuclear-weapon States party to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) have fulfilled their undertaking, assumed at the time of approval by the IAEA Board of Governors of the Model Additional Protocol in 1997, to conclude such APs.
The entry into force of the US AP brings the number of States with APs to 89 and contributes to efforts aimed at achieving universal application of APs.