IPPNW statement on the US-Russia Presidential Joint Statement on Strategic Stability; Geneva, 16 June 2021

IPPNW, which along with Pugwash initiated the 7 June 2021 Russian-American High-Level Appeal to Presidents Biden and Putin on the issues of preventing nuclear war and nuclear disarmament, strongly welcomes the “US-Russia Presidential Joint Statement on Strategic Stability,” adopted by the two leaders at their meeting in Geneva on 16 June 2021.

By proclaiming the “shared goals of ensuring predictability in the strategic sphere, reducing the risk of armed conflicts and the threat of nuclear war,” the Presidential Statement offers hope for a much-needed shift from the climate of suspicion, misunderstanding and hostility that has characterised Russia-US relations in recent years. We look forward to early constructive outcomes from the integrated Strategic Stability Dialogue initiated by the presidents of Russia and the US.

In reaffirming the principle that “nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought,” the Statement again establishes this essential truth as the foundation of negotiations between their two countries.

We hope that other nuclear weapons states, especially the Permanent Members of the UN Security Council, will also soon embrace this principle.

We call on President Putin and President Biden to make rapid progress on reducing and eliminating nuclear dangers based on this Statement. We urge them to recognize that nuclear weapons do not make either country more secure and are, in fact, the principal threat to their national security and to the security of the entire planet. We call on them to begin now negotiations for further deep reductions in their nuclear forces, which will pave the way for a verifiable, enforceable, time-bound agreement among all nine nuclear-armed nations to eliminate their nuclear weapons and accede to the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons that entered into force in January of this year.