Digging into the negotiating details
Thea Katrin Mjelstad presents ICAN’s views on core ban treaty prohibitions.
Ban treaty negotiations day 3:
Ray Acheson summed up the principal goal of the ban treaty yesterday in WILPF’s statement to the ban treaty negotiators: “In order to be effective as a prohibition treaty that leads to the elimination of nuclear weapons, the core prohibitions of the treaty should be as clear and comprehensive as possible.” Read more…
The ban treaty is transformative
Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom (WILPF)
Statement to the UN conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons, leading to their elimination, Topic 2
Delivered by Ray Acheson, Director of Reaching Critical Will
29 March 2017
Ray Acheson urges the conference to produce the strongest possible prohibition
Thank you Madame President,
Thank you for this opportunity to address this conference. WILPF has prepared a paper on principles, prohibitions, and positive obligations of a treaty banning nuclear weapons. After listening closely to interventions from delegations this morning, I would like to comment on a few of the prohibitions and positive obligations. Read more…
We must fill the legal gap completely
[ICAN delivered the following statement on core prohibitions that should be included in the ban treaty during the civil society session of the negotiation conference on March 29.]
Thea Katrin Mjelstad presents ICAN’s views on core ban treaty prohibitions.
Madam President:
I speak on behalf of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, ICAN, and its partner organization Norwegian People’s Aid Solidarity Youth.
The community of nations must fully seize this historic opportunity to establish an unambiguous, comprehensive global prohibition on the very worst weapons of mass destruction. Read more…
Wholly unacceptable and unethical weapons
ICAN statement on preambular elements
UN Conference to Negotiate a Legally Binding Instrument to Prohibit Nuclear Weapons, Leading Towards Their Total Elimination
Linnet Ngayu speaking for ICAN at ban treaty negotiations
Thank you, Madam President.
The International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons, ICAN, wishes to make the
following recommendations for the preamble:
First and foremost, it must convey our deep concern at the catastrophic
humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons – and our determination,
for the sake of all humankind, to eliminate these abhorrent, earth-destroying
weapons forevermore. Read more…
“We may not have a second chance”
[IPPNW co-president Tilman Ruff delivered the following statement to the United Nations conference to negotiate a legally binding instrument to prohibit nuclear weapons leading towards their total elimination. Watch the video on IPPNW’s YouTube channel.]
Tilman Ruff prepares to address the ban treaty conference
UN New York 29 March 2017
These negotiations grew out the humanitarian initiative, advanced by ICRC president Kellenberger’s 2010 call to the Geneva diplomatic corps, and the subsequent recognition of the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of any use of nuclear weapons in the consensus outcome document of the 2010 NPT Review Conference. Read more…
Actually banning nuclear weapons
Sue Coleman-Haseldine (r) and Setsuko Thurlow prepare to address the ban treaty negotiations at the UN
Ban treaty negotiations day 2:
ICAN executive director Beatrice Fihn captured the spirit of the day during our debriefing meeting, when she said “Today it felt like we made the transition from arguing that we need a ban treaty to actually banning nuclear weapons.” Read more…
“The ban treaty will change the world”
[The following statement was read by Hiroshima survivor Setsuko Thurlow, on behalf of ICAN, during the first series of civil society statements at the ban treaty negotiations conference.]
Hiroshima survivor Setsuko Thurlow delivers impassioned opening statement on behalf of ICAN
Distinguished Delegates,
I am honored to be given this opportunity, as a survivor from Hiroshima, to speak at this historic occasion. Already 72 years have passed since my beloved hometown was utterly destroyed by one atomic bomb. Read more…
First day of negotiations “an historic and essential step”
Day 1 at the ban treaty negotiations:
ICRC president Peter Maurer addresses the conference by video
ICAN campaigners on the floor of Conference Room 4 counted 115 states participating, a really encouraging number that we hope to increase during the week. After high-level opening statements delivered on behalf of the Secretary General and Pope Francis, and from UN High Representative of Disarmament Affairs Kim Won-soo, ICRC president Peter Maurer, and atomic bomb survivor Toshiko Fujimori, the conference heard opening statements from 24 individual states and five regional groupings. A list of states who spoke and copies of their statements, when available, are on the Reaching Critical Will website. Read more…
[The following statement by ICAN was released at the opening of UN negotiations on a treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons.]
Today, negotiations on a treaty to ban nuclear weapons in international law began in New York. The treaty is being negotiated based on the recognition that the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons use is morally unacceptable and that the weapons themselves represent a significant risk to human security. Read more…
Family-friendly nukes?!?
Moms for Nukes launched at UN today
This morning’s opening of the historic negotiations on a treaty to prohibit nuclear weapons has been a study in contrasts.
As States and civil society gathered in the UN General Assembly to hear powerful opening statements from representatives of the Secretary General, Pope Francis, the ICRC, Hiroshima and Nagasaki survivors, and the State leaders of the ban treaty negotiations, the UN ambassadors from three nuclear-armed States—the US, the UK, and France—stood outside the room to announce their boycott of the negotiations. Read more…
Bimal Khadka
Bjorn Hilt
Charles K. Johnson
Gunnar Westberg
IPPNW
John Loretz
Lawrence Wittner
Maria Valenti
mollymcgint
Sue Wareham
Tilman Ruff
Tim Wright
Xanthe Hall
IPPNW peace and health blog 