UN urges world powers to ban adopt global treating banning use of nuclear weapons
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Alaina
- . January 23, 2021
- . Update: January 23, 2021 11:44 pm
On Friday, the global treating proposing ban on nuclear weapons, Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW), came into force. The UN-backed treaty has so far been signed by 51 nations all across the world in the hope to deter the use, production and testing of nuclear weapons. The treaty, despite all that it has been campaigning for, lacked the support of world nuclear powers. Hence the legally binding aspect of the agreement is so far limited to its small pool of nations that have endorsed it.
The world nuclear powers doesn’t seem to be up for accepting or promoting the treaty. In November, slamming the significance of the treaty Jens Stoltenberg, the secretary general of NATO, said that the treaty ignored the practical aspect of the current global security scenario. “Giving up our deterrent without any guarantees that others will do the same is a dangerous option,” he said. “A world where Russia, China, North Korea and others have nuclear weapons, but NATO does not, is not a safer world.”
The TPNW forbade creation, possession and deployment of nuclear weapons by any of its signatories and also forced the member nations to come to the aid of other victims of nuclear weapons use and testing.The treaty got formulated by a UN working group in 2016. It was backed by 123 countries, while 38 nations opposed it. The US, UK, France, Israel and Russia were among the nations who advocated against the treaty, given their nuclear prowess which gave them upper hand over the rest. China, India and Pakistan abstained from taking any side.
Among the signatories of the treaty included Nigeria, Malaysia, Ireland, Malta, Thailand, Mexico, South Africa, Bangladesh, New Zealand, Vietnam and the Vatican City. Last year US made another attempt at convincing its supporters to rescind their signatures.Besides UN and two-thirds of its member states who adopted the treaty, many rights group also promoted the treaty stating that it initiated a strong global resolution towards eliminating the most inhumane and destructive weapons.“Until now, nuclear weapons have been the only weapons of mass destruction not subject to a global ban treaty, despite the catastrophic harm they inflict.
Today’s momentous change in international law – the result of decades of campaigning by civil society – brings us one step closer to abolishing the nuclear threat for good,” said Verity Coyle, Amnesty International’s Senior Advisor on Military, Security and Policing.“However, it is deeply worrying that none of the states who possess nuclear weapons have joined this treaty. Nuclear deterrence is a strategy based on the threat of killing millions of people and unleashing humanitarian and environmental catastrophe, and it has no place in today’s world.”
