NUCLEAR ARMS

RACE
A report on Nuclear
Proliferation
By:
Bani Mahajan
Amreen Chadha
Abhinav Aggarwal
 1

Reframing the nuclear weapons debate

The catastrophic effects of nuclear weapons on our health, societies and the environment
must be at the centre of all discussions about nuclear disarmament and non-proliferation.

A bolishing nuclear weapons

is a paramount challenge
for people and governments
A HUMANITARIAN APPROACH
Although the number of nuclear
about nuclear weapons must
focus not on narrow concepts
weapons in global stockpiles is of national security, but on the
the world over – a pre- declining, the risk of their use, effects of these weapons on
condition for survival, by accident or design, appears to human beings – our health, our
sustainability and the health of be growing. Any such use would societies, and the environment
our planet and future have catastrophic humanitarian on which we all depend. The
generations. Both in the scale consequences. Despite new processes that led to treaties
of the indiscriminate
rhetoric in favour of achieving a banning landmines in 1997
devastation they cause, and in
world without nuclear weapons, and cluster munitions in 2008
their uniquely persistent,
governments have not yet demonstrated the importance
spreading, genetically damaging
radioactive fallout, nuclear begun negotiations on a global of adopting a humanitarian-
weapons are unlike any other nuclear disarmament treaty. based discourse: new political
weapons. A single nuclear bomb The International Campaign coalitions were formed,
detonated over a large city could to Abolish Nuclear Weapons longstanding deadlocks were
kill millions of people in an (ICAN), a movement of non- broken, and two whole classes
instant. The use of tens government organizations in of weapons were outlawed.
or hundreds of nuclear bombs 60 countries advocating such a Today we must adopt a similar
would disrupt the global climate, treaty, believes that discussions approach for nuclear weapons.
causing widespread famine.
 2

A unique existential threat to humanity

The effects of nuclear weapons cannot be controlled in space or time.
Their existence anywhere is a threat to people everywhere.

N uclear weapons are the

most destructive, inhumane
and indiscriminate instruments
NUCLEAR WEAPONSUSE
Nuclear weapons have been
used twice in warfare – on the
NUCLEAR ARSENALS
The dangers of nuclear weapons
arise from their very existence.
of mass murder ever created. Japanese cities of Hiroshima Nine countries today possess
The term “catastrophic and Nagasaki in 1945. More an estimated 19,000 nuclear
humanitarian consequences” than 200,000 innocent civilians weapons, around 2,000 of which
– now commonly used by died, while many more suffered are kept on hair-trigger alert –
governments – describes their acute injuries. Even if a nuclear ready for use within minutes. NUCLEAR FORCES IN2012

unique and horrifying effects on weapon were never again Most of today’s nuclear weapons Country Warhead
s
people, including lethal harm to exploded over a city, there are are dozens of times more United States
those who are not part of the effects from the production, powerful than the Hiroshima Russia 8,000
United Kingdom 10,00
conflicts in which they are used. testing and deployment of bomb. The failure of the nuclear France 0
Physicians and scientists have nuclear arsenals that are powers to disarm has heightened China 225
experienced as an ongoing the risk that other countries, or India 300
long studied and documented Pakistan 240
the medical consequences of personal and community terrorists, will one day acquire Israel 80–100
nuclear war, concluding that catastrophe by many people nuclear weapons. The only North Korea 90–110
80
human security and survival around the globe. This must guarantee against their spread Total
<10
depend upon ridding the Earth inform and motivate efforts to and use is to eliminate them Source: FAS
~19,00
of these indefensible weapons. eliminate these weapons. without delay. 0
 “The conference expresses its deep concern at the catastrophic
humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons.”
Final Document, Non-Proliferation Treaty Review Conference, 2010

Mushroom cloud: A 37-kiloton nuclear device Obliteration: The Japanese city of Hiroshima was instantly reduced to ashes when
is exploded in Nevada. Credit: US Government a single US 15-kiloton nuclear bomb was detonated over it. Credit: US Government
 5

Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings

The two atomic bombs dropped on Japan in 1945 killed and maimed hundreds
of thousands of people, and their effects are still being felt today.

T he highly enriched uranium

bomb detonated over
Hiroshima on 6 August 1945
MEDICAL RESPONSE
In Hiroshima 90 per cent of
physicians and nurses were killed
LONG-TERM EFFECTS
The incidence of leukaemia
among survivors increased
had an explosive yield equal to or injured; 42 of 45 hospitals noticeably five to six years
15,000 tonnes of TNT. It razed were rendered non-functional; after the bombings, and about
and burnt around 70 per cent and 70 per cent of victims had a decade later survivors began
of all buildings and caused an combined injuries including, in suffering from thyroid, breast,
estimated 140,000 deaths by most cases, severe burns. All the lung and other cancers at higher
the end of 1945, along with dedicated burn beds around the than normal rates. For solid
DEATHS BY END OF1945
increased rates of cancer and world would be insufficient to cancers, the added risks related
Hiroshim ~140,000
chronic disease among the care for the survivors of a single to radiation exposure continue a ~74,000
survivors. A slightly larger nuclear bomb on any city. In to increase throughout the Nagasaki
plutonium bomb exploded Hiroshima and Nagasaki most lifespan of survivors even to this
over Nagasaki three days later victims died without any care day, almost seven decades after exposed to radiation in their
levelled 6.7 km2 of the city and to ease their suffering. Some the bombings. Women exposed mother’s womb were more likely
killed 74,000 people by the end of the people who entered the to the bombings while they were to be mentally retarded, and
of 1945. Ground temperatures cities after the bombings to pregnant experienced higher have smaller brains and impaired
reached 7,000°C and black provide assistance also died from rates of miscarriage and deaths growth, as well as increased risk
radioactive rain poured down. radiation-related illnesses. among their infants. Children of developing cancer.
Burns: Nagasaki bomb victim Sumiteru Taniguchi looks
at a photo of himself taken in 1945. His horrific burns
have required 17 operations. Credit: Yuriko Nakao

SUMITERU TANIGUCHI’S STORY

“As a 16-year-old boy, I was suffered such awful pain during

riding my bicycle down the street that time that I often called out
when the atomic bomb exploded ‘Please kill me!’ as I was being
1.8 km away, scorching my back treated. Among the survivors of
and leaving the skin on my the atomic bombing, there are
right arm hanging down from those who committed suicide
the shoulder to the fingertips. and those who died after saying
Most of the people around me they couldn’t stand yet another
had no one to look after them, operation. As someone who
and passed away while begging knows about this, I feel that I
for water. I spent two nights up have a responsibility to live my
in the mountainside before a life to the very end. Sometimes
rescue squad found me on the it’s a struggle. I’ll keep on
morning of the third day and fighting until all nuclear weapons
took me to a first-aid station are banished from this Earth. To
some 28 km away. I went from everyone who is reading this, I
one aid station to another until I beg you to think of yourselves as
was finally released from Omura parents building a bright future
Naval Hospital in March 1949. I for your descendants.”
“We witnessed a sight totally unlike
anything we had ever seen before.
The centre of the city was sort
of a white patch, flattened and
smooth like the palm of a hand.
Nothing remained. Every living
thing was petrified in an attitude
of acute pain.”
Dr Marcel Junod, International Committee of
the Red Cross, Hiroshima, September 1945

Total devastation: A mother and her son in Hiroshima four

months after the atomic bombing. Credit: Alfred Eisenstaedt
Heat and blast: House No. 1, located 1 km from ground
zero, is completely destroyed during a nuclear test in
Nevada in 1953. The elapsed time from the first picture
to the last is two seconds. Credit: US Government

EFFECTS OF A 100-KT NUCLEARBOMB

3 km radius A radioactive fireball hotter

than the Sun and with the
force of 100,000 tonnes of
TNT kills everyone.

5 km radius The vast majority of people

die quickly from blast injuries,
asphyxiation or (over weeks)
radiation sickness.

10 km radius About half die from trauma

and burns. Many succumb
soon after to fires and
radiation sickness.

80 km radius Radioactive fallout spreads.

Over time, many thousands
will die from radiation
sickness and cancers.
 7

Blast, heat and radiation

It takes around 10 seconds for the fireball from a nuclear explosion
to reach its maximum size, but the effects last for decades.

N uclear weapons are unique

in their destructive power
and the threat they pose to
HEAT
Thermal radiation from the
explosion is so intense that
cancers such as thyroid, lung
and breast cancers. Increased
rates of leukaemia and thyroid
the environment and human almost everything close to cancer among exposed children
survival. They release vast ground zero is vaporized. The begin to appear after five years,
amounts of energy in the form extreme heat causes severe while the incidence of most
of blast, heat and radiation. burns and ignites fires over a solid cancers rises after about
large area, which coalesce into a 10 years, with the increased risk
BLAST giant firestorm. Even people in persisting throughout one’s life.
A nuclear explosion creates underground shelters face likely Radiation exposure can also
Genes: Chromosomal damage in a
an enormous shockwave death due to a lack of oxygen nuclear test veteran. Credit: R. Rowland heighten the risk of hereditary
that reaches speeds of many and carbon monoxide poisoning. effects in future generations.
hundreds of kilometres an hour. damages organs and causes Radiation exposure can occur
The blast kills people close to RADIATION rapid death. At low doses, it externally (from particles in the
ground zero, and causes lung Unlike conventional weapons, can damage cells and lead to air, water and soil) or internally
injuries, ear damage and internal nuclear weapons release ionizing cancer, genetic damage and (from breathing, eating and
bleeding further away. People radiation: particles and rays given mutations. In human beings, it drinking). Many radioisotopes
sustain injuries from collapsing off by radioactive materials. At causes most types of leukaemia, are concentrated in plants and
buildings and flying objects. high doses, radiation kills cells, or blood cancer, as well as solid animals, and thus the food chain.
 8

Climate disruption and nuclear famine

A regional nuclear war involving as few as 100 Hiroshima-sized weapons
would disrupt the global climate and put a billion people at risk of famine.

N uclear weapons are the

only devices ever created
with the capacity to destroy all
would be at risk of famine,
according to recent research by
the International Physicians for
blocking up to 10 per cent
of sunlight from reaching
the Earth’s surface. Sudden
be emitted into the stratosphere,
resulting in a 45 per cent global
reduction in rainfall and average
complex life forms on Earth the Prevention of Nuclear War. global cooling would shorten surface cooling of –7 to –8°C.
within a relatively short period. Although it would not result growing seasons, threatening By comparison, the global
A war fought using 1,000 nuclear in the extinction of the human agriculture worldwide. Increases average cooling at the depth of
weapons – around 5 per cent of race, it would bring about an in food prices would make the last ice age more than 18,000
the total global stockpile – would end to modern civilization as we food inaccessible to hundreds years ago was –5°C.
render the planet uninhabitable. know it. Even the relatively small of millions of the poorest
nuclear arsenals of countries people in the world. For those OZONE DEPLETION
REGIONAL NUCLEAR WAR such as India and Pakistan could who are already chronically A nuclear war would cause
In addition to causing tens of cause long-lasting global damage malnourished, just a 10 per cent prolonged and severe depletion
millions of immediate deaths, a to the Earth’s ecosystems. decline in food consumption of the ozone layer and have a
regional nuclear war involving would result in starvation. devastating impact on human
around 100 Hiroshima-sized AGRICULTURAL COLLAPSE Infectious disease epidemics and and animal health. Substantial
weapons would disrupt the The smoke and dust from conflict over scarce resources increases in ultraviolet radiation
global climate and agricultural a limited nuclear war would would be rife. If the entire global would cause increases in skin
production so severely that cause an abrupt drop in global nuclear arsenal were used, 150 cancer rates, crop damage and
more than a billion people temperatures and rainfall by million tonnes of smoke would the destruction of marine life.
 “Climate change may be the global policy issue that has captured most attention
in the last decade, but the problem of nuclear weapons is at least its equal in
terms of gravity – and much more immediate in its potential impact.”
International Commission on Nuclear Non-Proliferation and Disarmament, 2009

Famine: Somali men carry a severely malnourished child to hospital. The use of 100 Crop failure: A regional nuclear war would result in agricultural
nuclear weapons would put a billion people at risk of famine. Credit: UN Photo/Stuart Price collapse over a wide area. Credit: UN Photo/Martine Perret
 11

The radioactive incineration of cities

The death toll from a nuclear attack against a large city today could be
measured in the millions rather than the tens or hundreds of thousands.

S cientists have modelled the

catastrophic humanitarian
consequences of nuclear strikes
September 11 terrorist attacks.
Blast and thermal effects would
kill 52,000 people immediately.
MILLIONS KILLED
15
Source: Science

This graph shows M

against various urban centres. In Another 238,000 would be the estimated
a city like Mumbai, India, with exposed to direct radiation number of fatalities
due to immediate
population densities in some from the blast. Fallout would radiation, blast and 10
M
areas of 100,000 people per expose a further million and a fire damage from 50
nuclear weapons
square kilometre, a Hiroshima- half people. In total, more than
with 15-kiloton yields
sized bomb is estimated to cause 200,000 would die. on various countries. 5M
up to 870,000 deaths in the first The total death toll
from cancers and
weeks. A 1-megaton bomb could FULL-SCALE NUCLEARWAR wider environmental

PAKISTA
The effects of a war involving

FRANCE
promptly kill several million.

RUSSIA
BRAZIL

ISRAEL
EGYPT
CHINA

JAPAN
effects would be

IRAN
INDI
many nuclear explosions

UK

US
substantially higher.

N
A
TERRORIST SCENARIO would be on a scale larger than
A 12.5-kiloton nuclear explosion anything previously experienced
in a New York shipping yard in human history. If 500 an hour and tens of millions fallout. Most Americans and
would produce casualties more warheads were to hit major US would be fatally injured. Huge Russians would die in the
than one order of magnitude and Russian cities, 100 million swaths of both countries would following months from radiation
greater than those inflicted in the people would die in the first half be blanketed by radioactive sickness and disease epidemics.
Nevada: Judith Vollmer, poet and teacher, has Utah: Dave Timothy, a “down winder”, believes
come to Sedan Crater on the Nevada Test Site his multiple thyroid cancers were caused by the
to better understand the loss of her father to radiation from atomic tests that rained down on his
radiation-related illnesses. Credit: Lynn Johnson boyhood home in Utah. Credit: Lynn Johnson
Semipalatinsk: A Kazakh nuclear test victim receives
treatment. Between 1949 and 1991, 456 Soviet
nuclear tests were conducted at Semipalatinsk.
Credit: Jonathan Silvers/Saybrook Productions Ltd
Refugees: Libyan refugees line up for food near the
border with Tunisia. A nuclear attack would potentially
displace millions of people. Credit: OCHA/David Ohana

WORLD HEALTHORGANIZATION

“Nuclear weapons constitute the greatest

immediate threat to the health and welfare
of mankind .... It is obvious that no health
service in any area of the world would
be capable of dealing adequately with
the hundreds of thousands of people
seriously injured by blast, heat or radiation
from even a single one-megaton bomb
.... Whatever remained of the medical
services in the world could not alleviate
the disaster in any significant way .... To
the immediate catastrophe must be added
the long-term effects on the environment.
Famine and diseases would be widespread,
and social and economic systems would
be totally disrupted .... Therefore the only
approach to the treatment of the health
effects of nuclear explosions is primary
prevention of such explosions.”
 15

No adequate response capacity

A nuclear attack anywhere in the world would overwhelm the health
infrastructure, making an effective humanitarian response impossible.

N uclear bombings eradicate

the social infrastructure
required for recovery from
THE RED CROSS
Consistent with the humanitarian
vision of its founder Henry
UN AGENCIES
In 1984, at the height of the
cold war, the World Health
conflict. Communications Dunant, the International Organization published a
and transportation systems, Committee of the Red Cross definitive study on the global
fire-fighting equipment, and first called for nuclear weapons health repercussions of nuclear
hospitals and pharmacies would to be banned in September war. Its report, updated in 1987,
all lie in rubble throughout a 1945, just weeks after the atomic concluded that the immediate
zone of complete destruction bombings of Hiroshima and and delayed loss of human
extending for kilometres. Those Nagasaki. Since then, it has and animal life would be
attempting to provide relief repeatedly warned that nuclear enormous, and “the plight of
to the sick or wounded would weapons will not spare hospitals, survivors would be physically
be exposed to high levels of prisoner-of-war camps and and psychologically appalling”.
radioactivity, risking their own civilians, and “their inevitable Nuclear disarmament is directly
lives. Nowhere in the world consequence is extermination”. relevant to the work of many
would it be possible to render an In 2010 the Committee adopted UN agencies, including those
effective humanitarian response, the prohibition and complete responsible for refugees, human
underscoring the absolute elimination of nuclear weapons rights, development, food
imperative of nuclear abolition. as one of its top priorities. security and the environment.
Australia: As a 10-year-old boy, Yami Lester was covered by a cloud of Marshall Islands: Iroji Kebenli, a Marshallese boy, suffered radiation burns to
radioactive fallout from a British nuclear test conducted at Emu Junction in his skin after contact with “Bikini snow” – radioactive ash and coral fragments
1953 with the support of the Australian government. Credit: Jessie Boylan dispersed over the islands from US nuclear tests. Credit: US Government

Algeria: A danger sign warns of the toxic

legacy of French nuclear testing in Algeria
in the 1960s. Credit: Nic Maclellan
 17

The legacy of nuclear testing

Physicians project that some 2.4 million people worldwide will eventually die from
cancers due to atmospheric nuclear tests conducted between 1945 and 1980.

S ince the dawn of the

atomic age in July 1945,
nuclear weapons have been
NUCLEAR TEST SITES
Nuclear tests have been carried
out at more than 60 locations
NUCLEAR TESTS
A NUCLEAR TEST BAN
Public concern in the 1950s
about the health and environ-
Programme No. tests
tested on more than 2,000 around the globe, often on USA 1,054
mental impacts of nuclear
occasions – in the atmosphere, the lands of indigenous and Russia/USSR 715 testing, including its effect on
underground and underwater. minority peoples, far away from France 210 mothers’ milk and babies’ teeth,
United Kingdom 45
The toll on human health and those who made the decisions China 45 led to the negotiation in 1963
the environment has been to conduct them. While some India 6 of a treaty banning atmospheric
staggering. Today we each test sites have been virtually Pakistan 6 and underwater nuclear tests. A
North Korea 2
carry in our bodies radioactive uninhabited, others have comprehensive nuclear test ban,
Total 2,083
substances from the fallout of been densely populated. The covering underground tests, was
nuclear testing, increasing our tests have irradiated people negotiated in 1996. Although the
risk of developing cancer. Much working on the programmes, of Nuclear War has estimated latter treaty has not yet entered
of the Earth’s surface has been the downwind and downstream that roughly 2.4 million people into legal force, full-scale nuclear
contaminated at some point with communities, and the whole will eventually die as a result of testing has largely come to halt.
radioactive particles. Nuclear global population. The the atmospheric nuclear tests However, a number of countries
testing enables governments to Nobel Peace Prize-winning conducted between 1945 and continue to test their nuclear
increase the destructiveness and organization International 1980, which were equal in force weapons sub-critically, involving
lethality of their nuclear forces. Physicians for the Prevention to 29,000 Hiroshima bombs. no chain reaction.
18

Production of nuclear weapons

The production of the explosive materials used in all nuclear weapons – highly enriched
uranium and separated plutonium – is harmful to human health and the environment.

N uclear weapons derive

their explosive force from
uranium and/or plutonium, the
lands of indigenous peoples.
Large volumes of waste tailings
result in long-lasting radioactive
linked. Most of the recent
instances of nuclear proliferation
have stemmed from ostensibly
latter of which is a by-product and chemical pollution. No peaceful programmes. Releases
of nuclear fission in reactors. uranium mine anywhere in the of radiation similar to or larger
The production of both world has been fully cleaned up than those from a nuclear bomb
substances causes widespread after mining has finished. Fissile can come from nuclear reactors
environmental contamination materials created from uranium and spent fuel ponds – meaning
and is harmful to human health. ore remain toxic and weapons- that every reactor is, in effect, a
usable for many millennia. Any giant pre-positioned dirty bomb.
MINING & ENRICHINGURANIUM enrichment plant that can enrich Nuclear accidents, such as that at
Uranium, its radioactive decay uranium to reactor grade can Chernobyl in 1986, will eventu-
products, and other substances also enrich it to weapons grade. ally cause at least several tens
released through uranium mining of thousands of cancer deaths.
and processing can cause disease NUCLEAR REACTORS Even during normal use, nuclear
in mineworkers, nuclear industry Plutonium is produced from reactors emit radiation into the
workers and nearby inhabitants. uranium in a nuclear reactor. Ranger Mine: Yvonne Margarula, a
Mirarr elder from Australia, has long
air, water and soil, resulting in
More than 70 per cent of the Military and civilian nuclear fought to protect her country from increased rates of leukaemia in
uranium mining. Credit: Dominic O’Brien
world’s uranium is mined on the programmes are often closely children living within 50 km.
 “A phase-out of civilian nuclear energy would provide the most effective and
enduring constraint on proliferation risks in a nuclear-weapon-free world.”
International Panel on Fissile Materials, 2009

Chernobyl: Useless against gamma radiation, these Fukushima: A baby is tested for radiation in 2011,
gas masks lie strewn across an empty classroom four days after an earthquake and tsunami struck the
floor in Pripyat, Ukraine. Credit: Ricky Pitman Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. Credit: Kyodo
 Hunger: A woman holding her young malnourished baby queues for
food in Somalia. Money spent on nuclear weapons could be redirected
towards meeting basic human needs. Credit: UN Photo/Stuart Price

“The world is over-armed and peace is under-funded .... The end of the cold war has led the
world to expect a massive peace dividend. Yet, there are over 20,000 nuclear weapons around
the world. Many of them are still on hair-trigger alert, threatening our own survival.”
United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, Mexico City, 2009
 21

A diversion of public resources

As millions across the globe go hungry and are denied access to clean water, basic medicines and
sanitation, the nuclear-armed nations spend close to US$300 million a day on their nuclear forces.

T he production, maintenance
and modernization of
nuclear forces diverts vast
meet the internationally agreed
Millennium Development
Goals on poverty alleviation
ESTIMATED SPENDING ON
NUCLEAR WEAPONS IN 2011
public resources away from by the target date of 2015. Country USD
health care, education, climate Nuclear weapons spending in United States 61.3 bn
change mitigation, disaster relief, 2010 was more than twice the Russia 14.8 bn
China 7.6 bn
development assistance and official development assistance France 6.0 bn
other vital services. Globally, provided to Africa, the poorest United Kingdom 5.5 bn
India 4.9 bn
annual expenditure on nuclear continent on Earth, and equal to
Israel 1.9 bn
weapons is estimated at US$105 the gross domestic product of Pakistan 2.2 bn
billion – or $12 million an hour. Bangladesh, a nation of some North Korea 0.7 bn
160 million people. The Office Total US$104.9 bn
SPENDING ONDEVELOPMENT for Disarmament Affairs – the Source: Global Zero

The World Bank forecast in principal UN body responsible

2002 that an annual investment for advancing a nuclear-weapon-
of just US$40–60 billion, free world – has an annual Poverty: Achan Ajwal, a villager in South
or roughly half the amount budget of $10 million, which is Sudan, shows riverweed, her only diet
before a World Food Programme food
currently spent on nuclear less than the amount spent on distribution. Credit: UN Photo/Fred Noy
weapons, would be enough to nuclear weapons every hour.
 23

Outlawing inhumane weapons

There are treaties prohibiting biological weapons, chemical weapons, landmines
and cluster munitions, but no such treaty exists – as yet – for nuclear weapons.

T he international community
has negotiated conventions
to eliminate certain types of
PROHIBITED WEAPONS
HUMANITARIANLAW
Nuclear weapons cannot
distinguish between military
This disproportionate and
indiscriminate destructiveness
is clearly a violation of
Type of weapon Banned
weapons that cause unacceptable Biological weapons 1972
and civilian targets, or international humanitarian law.
harm to people and the Chemical weapons 1993 between combatants and
environment. These include Anti-personnel mines 1997 non-combatants. Most of the HUMANSECURITY
Cluster munitions 2008
biological and chemical weapons, casualties of a nuclear attack The catastrophic health and
landmines and, most recently, would inevitably be civilians. environmental consequences of
cluster munitions. Although Once the explosive energy of a nuclear war are at the extreme
the destructive capacity of nuclear chain reaction has been end of a continuum of armed
nuclear weapons is many times released, it cannot be contained. violence that undermines health
greater than that of these and People in neighbouring and and security. Outlawing and
all other weapons, they are not distant countries who have eliminating nuclear weapons
yet subject to a universal treaty nothing to do with the conflict is part of a broader struggle
ban. Nevertheless, their use is would suffer from the effects for genuine human-centred
prohibited under international of radioactive fallout, even if security founded on respect for
humanitarian law, and all nations they were at a safe distance basic rights, including rights to
are obliged to negotiate in good from the blast and thermal education, health care, decent
faith for nuclear disarmament. destruction near ground zero. work and a clean environment.
24

A nuclear weapons ban

To avert a humanitarian catastrophe of unprecedented proportions, nations
must intensify efforts to outlaw and eliminate nuclear weapons.

A n understanding of “the
devastation that would be
visited upon all mankind by a
A UNIVERSAL BAN
The most effective, expeditious
and practical way to achieve
WHAT IT COULD ENTAIL
A nuclear weapons convention
could take any number of
nuclear war” was the motivating and sustain the abolition of forms. Most likely, the treaty
force behind the adoption of nuclear weapons would be to would oblige nations to
the nuclear Non-Proliferation negotiate a comprehensive, disarm according to a series of
Treaty in 1968. Article VI of the irreversible, binding, verifiable progressive phases, beginning
agreement obliges all nations treaty – a nuclear weapons with taking their nuclear
to negotiate in good faith for convention – bringing together weapons off high-alert status.
total nuclear disarmament under all the necessary aspects of Preferably, it would also
strict and effective international nuclear disarmament and non- ban the production of fissile
control. More than four decades proliferation. Negotiations materials and stipulate that
on, however, this provision should begin without delay existing stocks be eliminated or
remains largely unfulfilled. At an and progress in good faith and placed under secure international
important review of the treaty in without interruption until a control. An international
May 2010, governments warned successful conclusion is reached. monitoring system and dedicated
that catastrophic humanitarian Such an approach is supported agency could be established
consequences could result from by the vast majority of people to verify compliance with all
continued failure to act. and governments worldwide. provisions of the treaty.
Everyone’s responsibility

development sector 2 Engaging United

Nations agencies 3 Building the political
will for a ban 4 Raising public
awareness

A nuclear attack anywhere in Nuclear disarmament is a Ultimately, the responsibility to Generating a powerful
the world would have profound longstanding objective of the disarm rests with governments. groundswell of public support
implications for the work of United Nations. It is directly All barriers to achieving a world for nuclear abolition will be key
organizations that provide relevant to the work of most free of nuclear weapons are to ensuring that all governments
disaster relief, refugee assistance of its major agencies, including political, not technical. The engage constructively in
and health care, as well as those the World Health Organization, growing recognition among negotiations for a nuclear
promoting human rights, food the Food and Agriculture governments of the catastrophic weapons ban. Information
security, poverty alleviation and Organization, u n i c e f , u n e s c o , humanitarian consequences of about the catastrophic effects of
environmental sustainability. All and the High Commissioners nuclear weapons is a positive nuclear weapons must be spread
such groups must play an active for Human Rights and Refugees. development. It must now through the mass media, become
role now in efforts to avert a The UN family must join forces translate into meaningful action part of the national education
humanitarian catastrophe by to address the continuing threat towards a treaty to outlaw and curriculum, and be shared widely
eliminating nuclear weapons. of nuclear conflict. eliminate nuclear weapons. through n g o networks.