Category: Nuclear Weapons

By Sergio Duarte, Ambassador, former U.N. High Representative for Disarmament Affairs*

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) – The opening for signature of the Treaty on the Prohibitions of Nuclear Weapons on September 20 at the United Nations in New York marks a milestone in the long history of efforts by the international community to eliminate the most destructive and cruel of all weapons invented by man.

The wide adherence to the negotiating process of the Treaty, carried out with the strong support of civil society organizations, reflected a growing global recognition that a ban on nuclear weapons is an integral part of the normative framework necessary to achieve and maintain a world free of such weapons. It is not a hasty or impromptu movement born out of frustration for the protracted lack of concrete progress on nuclear disarmament or by humanitarian considerations. Rather, it responds to a longstanding aspiration of humanity.

By Devendra Kamarajan

UNITED NATIONS (IDN) –”Trust within and among countries is being driven down by those who demonize and divide. We are a world in pieces. We need to be a world at peace,” said UN Secretary-General António Guterres in his address to the General Assembly on September 19.

In contrast, the U.S. President Donald Trump warned North Korea: “The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea.” He also threatened Iran and Venezuela.

Reacting to these threats, the Arms Control Association criticised Trump’s address as a failure of nuclear leadership. “Trump’s address is yet another sign that we are entering a dark and difficult phase in the long-running effort to reduce the threat posed by nuclear weapons,” said Daryl G. Kimball, Executive Director of the organization based in Washington, D.C.

By Ramesh Jaura

BERLIN | ASTANA (IDN) – Some three weeks before the UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons opens for signature on September 20 in New York, a landmark international conference in the capital city of Kazakhstan has called upon “all governments and people to reflect on the grave and irreversible ecological and humanitarian consequences of nuclear weapons and to spare no efforts towards achieving a nuclear-weapon-free world.”

The appeal, made by the Council of the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs, coincided with the International Day against Nuclear Tests, designated by the 64th session of the United Nations General Assembly on December 2, 2009 by unanimously adopting resolution 64/35. Watch Our Video

By Jamshed Baruah

NEW YORK | ULAANBAATAR (IDN) – While unanimously agreeing on tougher sanctions against the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK) in response to the country’s sixth and most powerful nuclear test early September, the UN Security Council called for the resumption of the Six-Party Talks.

By pleading for the multilateral negotiations involving China, DPRK, Japan, Republic of Korea, Russian Federation and the United States, the 15-member Council expressed its “commitment to a peaceful, diplomatic and political solution to the situation on the Korean Peninsula”.

The issue also drew the focus of the ‘International Conference on Nuclear Disarmament Issues: Global and Regional Aspects’ on August 31-September 1 some 10,150 kilometres away in Ulaanbaatar, the capital city of Mongolia, bordered by China to its south and the Russian Federation to it north.

By J C Suresh

TORONTO | WASHINGTON, DC (IDN) – As the U.S. Congress prepares to enact legislation “that could further imperil the global nuclear order,” a disarmament expert has urged the lawmakers “to seek to preserve and strengthen the existing architecture of arms control and non-proliferation agreements” – instead of rushing to hasten their demise.

The “key pillars” of the agreements “have their origin in the vision of President Ronald Reagan,” says Kingston Reif, director for disarmament and threat reduction policy at the Arms Control Association (ACA).

By J C Suresh

TORONTO | WASHINGTON, DC (IDN) – U.S. President Donald Trump and his administration have failed to competently execute their own stated policy of “maximum pressure and engagement” with North Korea, says the Arms Control Association (ACA), which is dedicated to promoting public understanding of and support for effective arms control policies.

In a statement on North Korea’s 5.9 to 6.3 magnitude nuclear test explosion on September 3, ACA’s Executive Director Daryl G. Kimball says: “Trump has greatly exacerbated the risks through irresponsible taunts and threats of U.S. military force that only give credibility to the North Korean propaganda line that nuclear weapons are necessary to deter U.S. aggression, and have spurred Kim Jong-un to accelerate his nuclear program.”

By Daryl G. Kimball*

The author is the Executive Director of the Arms Control Association. This article first appeared on August 29, 2017 in the Arms Control Today as a Focus Editorial with the caption Don’t Abandon the Iran Nuclear Deal, and is being republished by arrangement with that monthly journal on nonproliferation and global security. – The Editor

WASHINGTON (IDN-INPS) – Although his administration is already struggling with one major nonproliferation challenge – North Korea’s advancing nuclear and missile capabilities – President Donald Trump soon may initiate steps that could unravel the highly successful 2015 Iran nuclear deal, thereby creating a second major nonproliferation crisis.

By Ramesh Jaura

ASTANA (IDN) – While a moment of silence was observed on August 29 at 11:05 a.m. local time in Kazakhstan’s capital city Astana to honour the memory of the victims of all nuclear weapons tests, some 2713 miles (4365 kilometres) away, North Korea fired an intermediate range ballistic missile that flew over Japan: The same day a new facility was inaugurated in Kazakhstan under the auspices of the UN’s nuclear watchdog that could open a fresh chapter in non-proliferation.

In the five decades between July 1945, when the United States exploded its first atomic bomb, and the opening for signature of the Comprehensive Nuclear-Test-Ban Treaty (CTBT) in 1996, over 2,000 nuclear tests were carried out all over the world. After the CTBT was opened for signature in September 1996, nine nuclear tests had been conducted until 2016. Since then, only North Korea is known to have been conducting nuclear tests.

Courtesy Nuclear Age Peace Foundation (NAPF)

SANTA BARBARA (IDN-INPS) – Tony de Brum, former Foreign Minister of the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI), passed away on August 22, 2017. He was a powerful and inspiring voice for the abolition of nuclear weapons as well as climate sanity. He was a visionary leader, respected and admired throughout the world for his strength, wisdom, warmth and unceasing optimism.

Born in 1945, de Brum was one of the first Marshall Islanders to graduate from college. He played a key role in the negotiations that led to the first compact of free association between the U.S. and the RMI, and participated in the development of the Constitution of the Republic of the Marshall Islands.

By Lowana Veal

REYKJAVIK (IDN) – With a population of 344,000, Iceland does not have a military of its own. Nevertheless, it is a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and as such was one of the countries that boycotted the discussions leading up to the potentially groundbreaking UN Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, adopted on July 7.

Prior to the start of the conference leading up to the Treaty, Foreign Affairs Minister Gudlaugur Thor Thordarson replied to a parliamentary question by Left-Green MP Steinunn Thora Árnadóttir on whether Iceland would take part in the UN discussions about banning nuclear weapons, as she felt that the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation Nuclear Weapons (NPT) had not been very successful.