No nuclear powers have signed up to treaty, but supporters hope it’s start of something bigger
Tiny Honduras has become the fiftieth nation to ratify a UN ban on nuclear weapons, allowing the United Nations to officially ratify a treaty banning nuclear weapons.
A spokesperson for UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres described the ‘historic’ moment as:
the culmination of a worldwide movement to draw attention to the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons.
It represents a meaningful commitment towards the total elimination of nuclear weapons, which remains the highest disarmament priority of the United Nations.
No nuclear powers have signed up to the treaty, but Peter Maurer of the International Committee of the Red Cross welcomed it:
Today is a victory for humanity, and a promise of a safer future.
More than eighty states have signed the treaty, but not all have yet formally ratified it. It forbids using, developing, producing, stationing, stockpiling or threatening to use nuclear weapons.
Campaigners hope that its ratificiation will stigmatise the possession of such weapons sufficiently to pressure nuclear-armed states to reduce or eliminate their stockpiles, while ICAN (International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons) said it now expects companies end production of the weapons and financial institutions to stop investing in such companies.
The SKWAWKBOX needs your help. The site is provided free of charge but depends on the support of its readers to be viable. If you can afford to, please click here to arrange a one-off or modest monthly donation via PayPal or here to set up a monthly donation via GoCardless (SKWAWKBOX will contact you to confirm the GoCardless amount). Thanks for your solidarity so SKWAWKBOX can keep bringing you information the Establishment would prefer you not to know about.
If you wish to republish this post for non-commercial use, you are welcome to do so – see here for more.
The world’s most stupid weapons, in a whole panoply of stupid weapons.
Nuclear weapons are weapons of aggression not defence. Anyone who sanctions their use is a psychopath.
The UN is increasingly becoming a talk shop without any powers or credibility..Historically,they are not to be trusted and have played in a dubious power game since the 1960s at the wim of the more powerful nations.Look to the Palestinian resolution and the involvement in peacekeeping missions and its nothing to be proud of.More good jobs for the boys.
Doubt China Russia America Britain will follow suit for a long time by then they have another super weapons
CV19 ???
Sadly I was too late to get a picture but I once saw a smallish idiot in a studded black leather motorcycle jacket and one of those short, thick twisted leather leads, at the other end of which was a massive Alsation dog pissing against a lamppost.
What the idiot hadn’t yet noticed, or was too embarrassed to react to, was that the stream of piss was being deflected off the lamppost and making a big wet patch on his jeans.
If I hadn’t missed that picture I could have captioned it
NUCLEAR WEAPONS? DON’T BE STUPID