By Xanthe Hall* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
“Possession does not prevent international disputes from occurring, but it makes conflicts more dangerous. Maintaining forces on alert does not provide safety, but it increases the likelihood of accidents. Upholding doctrines of nuclear deterrence does not counter proliferation, but it makes the weapons more desirable.” – UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon.
The Third International Conference on the Humanitarian Consequences of Nuclear Weapons in the Austrian capital Vienna on December 8 and 9 should provide further impetus to efforts to end the era of nuclear weapons, an era in which these apocalyptic weapons have been seen as the linchpin of national security for a number of states, writes Daisaku Ikeda, a Japanese Buddhist philosopher and peace-builder, who presides over the Soka Gakkai International (SGI), in this article for IPS-Inter Press Service and IDN.
By Daisaku Ikeda* | IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint
TOKYO (IDN) – As we approach the 70th anniversary next year of the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, there are growing calls to place the humanitarian consequences of their use at the heart of deliberations about nuclear weapons.
By Jayantha Dhanapala* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
KANDY, Sri Lanka (IDN) – In 2015 it will be 70 years since the horrible bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki by the USA – the only time nuclear weapons were ever used. The urgent need to seek solutions over nuclear weapons in North-east Asia was highlighted in the following paragraphs from the Asia Pacific Leaders Network’s (APLN) Jakarta Declaration of September 2014:
“Acutely conscious that the world’s more than 16,000 remaining nuclear weapons are strongly concentrated in the Asia Pacific region, with the US and Russia having over 90 per cent of the world’s stockpile and major strategic footprints here, China, India, and Pakistan all having significant arsenals, and the breakout state of North Korea continuing to build its capability,
By Shastri Ramachandaran* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
NEW DELHI (IDN) – Present-day summit meetings are about optics and atmospherics. It is the triumph of style over content. The meeting between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Barack Obama was no different. In the age of tweet and TV-driven news coverage, events take precedence over outcomes and sound bytes over substance.
Documents such as the vision statement or the joint statement, which in times past served as a measure of the agenda and accomplishments of bilateral meetings, are today ignored as pointless verbiage unavoidable for the record.
By D Ravi Kanth* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
GENEVA (IDN) – The commemoration of the United Nations International Day for the Total Elimination of Nuclear Weapons on September 26 was a grim reminder of the continued threat from nuclear weapons to people at large.
By Jamshed Baruah | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
VIENNA (IDN) – As the Austrian government prepares to host the third international conference on the humanitarian consequences of atomic weapons on December 8-9 in Vienna, the county’s parliament has provided it the legal basis for its commitment to usher in a world without nuclear weapons of mass destruction.
The forthcoming gathering in Vienna will be the third since the March 2013 conference in Oslo convened by the Norwegian Foreign Minister Espen Barth Eide who said the Conference had “provided an arena for a fact-based discussion of the humanitarian and developmental consequences of a nuclear weapons detonation”.
By Akira Kawasaki* | IDN-InDepth NewsViewpoint
August 6, 2014 marked the 69th anniversary of the first detonation of a nuclear weapon over Japan. The cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki held ceremonies commemorating those hundreds of thousands who perished in the two nuclear attacks in 1945, and the countless more whose lives would forever be affected. But in these past decades, can we say that we have truly learned from the tragedies of Hiroshima and Nagasaki? Is our recognition of the suffering inflicted upon those cities matched with the concrete action to ensure that it can never be repeated? Akira Kawasaki answers these and other questions in a contribution to IDN partner Pressenza
TOKYO (IDN) – While the numbers of nuclear weapons are down significantly from the days of the Cold War – when it seemed as though another Hiroshima or Nagasaki could be imminent – we are far from having secured our future against another such unspeakable human tragedy.
By Setsuko Thurlow | IDN-InDepth NewsDocument*
At the Little White House in Key West Florida, on 16 May 2014, atomic bomb testimony was delivered in an official forum on Truman ground for the first time. Together with Clifton Truman Daniel, Hibakusha Stories organized an event where Setsuko Thurlow and Yasuaki Yamashita were able to share their experience of being children in Hiroshima and Nagasaki respectively. Thanks to support from the Truman Family, The Little White House and The Harry S. Truman Library and Museum, atomic bomb survivors are now on the official record defending the position that nuclear weapons are immoral no matter in whose hands. The following is Setsuko Thurlow’s speech from that evening.
By Valentina Gasbarri* | IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
ROME (IDN) – The 10th anniversary of the adoption of the UN Security Council Resolution 1540 on April 28, 2014 can be especially propitious for standing back from the perennial present of international security issues and evaluating longer-term trends.
The threat posed by the spread of nuclear weapons and ballistic missiles is one of the main security challenges of the 21st century. The fall of the Berlin Wall and the end of the Cold War led to a gradual reduction both in the security framework and in the perception of security.
In order to address this challenge and develop appropriate solutions, accurate risk factors analysis is required, as well as the ability to generate a multi-dimensional response: promoting the development of a comprehensive non-proliferation regime while also trying to explore how nuclear energy can safely be harnessed for sustainable economic development. The implications of nuclear proliferation for international relations are difficult to predict but profound.
By Monzurul Huq* | IDN-InDepth NewsEssay
TOKYO (IDN) – Human memory is short, particularly when it comes to record war and destruction. Countless details of various times portraying the accounts of misery and human suffering probably remind us of something vague and abstract; something distant and detached, not at all related to the realities that we face at any given time. Since what is seen as vague or blurred hardly serves as solid evidence, and what is distant hardly seems inspiring for stirring our conscience to the level of awakening, we tend to forget about what war and destruction brings to mankind soon after the waves of tragic realities subside and pave the way for a relative tranquil setting, at least for a short time.
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