A senior UN official says Israel, which is widely believed to possess hundreds of atomic bombs, should ratify the nuclear test ban treaty within five years.

�I'm putting five years as the longest it should take now based on the positive sign that I'm seeing from Israel,� Lassina Zerbo, the executive secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBTO) Organization said Wednesday.

Zerbo met Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the first time during a visit to the occupied Palestinian territories in June.

Netanyahu reportedly�told Zerbo that Tel Aviv's ratification of the UN pact �is dependent on the regional context and on the appropriate timing.�



[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="555"] Lassina Zerbo, the executive secretary of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty Organization (L), speaks with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in Jerusalem al-Quds on June 20, 2016.[/caption]

The treaty, which bans all nuclear explosions, was signed in 1996, but has not entered into force because it still needs ratification by nuclear-armed signatories such as the US, China, Israel, Egypt, India, Pakistan and North Korea.

An open secret for decades, the Israeli atomic stockpile is estimated at some 200-400 warheads, though Israel refuses to confirm or deny its existence under a policy of deliberate ambiguity.

Israel is also refusing to sign the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and denying international access to its atomic arsenal.

Israel's arsenal is the only obstacle to a Middle East free of nuclear weapons because no country possesses a nuclear arsenal in the region other than the Tel Aviv regime.

By Press TV